Case-control study, 2019
Do women with PMDD have different hormone levels than healthy women?
Women with PMDD have lower estrogen levels during the early luteal phase. The combination of low early luteal estrogen and high early luteal progesterone together is associated with more severe PMDD symptoms.
What they did
63 women with PMDD and 53 controls had their estrogen and progesterone levels measured during both the early luteal and late luteal phases of the menstrual cycle. Researchers looked at whether hormone levels differed between groups and whether hormone patterns were linked to symptom severity.
What they found
Women with PMDD had lower estrogen levels in the early luteal phase compared to controls. Among women with lower early luteal estrogen, those with PMDD had higher early luteal progesterone than controls. The combination of low early luteal estrogen and high early luteal progesterone together was associated with greater PMDD symptom severity.
What it means for you
Low estrogen in the early luteal phase may be a factor in PMDD, and having both low estrogen and high progesterone at that time may be especially important. This was a prospective study with a relatively larger sample than many PMDD studies, but it does not explain what causes these hormone patterns.
63
Women with PMDD
53
Control women
About the study
- Original title
- Early- and Late-Luteal-Phase Estrogen and Progesterone Levels of Women with Premenstrual Dysphoric Disorder
- Authors
- Yen JY, Lin HC, Lin PC et al.
- Journal
- International journal of environmental research and public health
- Year
- 2019
- Study design
- Case-control study
- Participants
- 63
- What was tested
- None; observational study measuring hormone levels across menstrual cycle phases
- Open access
- Yes
- Read the paper
- doi.org/10.3390/ijerph16224352
Original abstract
: Objective/introduction: The dynamics of ovarian hormone fluctuations during the luteal phase of the menstruation cycle were previously suggested to contribute to the development of premenstrual dysphoric disorder (PMDD) symptoms, but adequate empirical evidence has not been obtained from hormone concentration studies. We prospectively evaluated estrogen and progesterone levels in the early luteal (EL) and late luteal (LL) phases in women with PMDD and the association of these levels with PMDD symptom severity. Methods: 63 women with PMDD and 53 controls without such severe symptoms were evaluated for the estrogen and progesterone levels, and PMDD severity in the EL and LL phases. Results: The results demonstrated that the women with PMDD had a lower EL-phase estrogen level than the controls. Covariant analysis demonstrated that the interaction term between EL-phase estrogen and EL-phase progesterone level was associated with PMDD severity. Among women with lower EL estrogen levels, higher EL-phase progesterone was observed among the women with PMDD versus controls. These results suggest that low EL-phase estrogen level could moderate the provoking effect of EL progesterone in women with PMDD. Overall, these data suggest a possible role of estrogen and progesterone in the development of PMDD symptoms.
Reproduced under CC-BY.
Topics
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