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Menstrual cycle characteristics and steroid hormone, prolactin, and growth factor levels in premenopausal women

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Abstract

Purpose

Menstrual cycle characteristics are markers of endocrine milieu. However, associations between age at menarche and adulthood sex steroid hormone levels have been inconsistent, and data on menstrual characteristics and non-sex steroid hormones are sparse.

Methods

We assessed the relations of menstrual characteristics with premenopausal plasma sex steroid hormones, sex hormone binding globulin (SHBG), prolactin, and growth factors among 2,745 premenopausal women (age 32–52) from the Nurses’ Health Study II. Geometric means and tests for trend were calculated using multivariable general linear models.

Results

Early age at menarche was associated with higher premenopausal early-follicular free estradiol (percent difference < 12 vs. > 13 years = 11%), early-follicular estrone (7%), luteal estrone (7%), and free testosterone (8%) (all p trend < 0.05). Short menstrual cycle length at age 18–22 was associated with higher early-follicular total (< 26 vs. > 39 days = 18%) and free estradiol (16%), early-follicular estrone (9%), SHBG (7%), lower luteal free estradiol (− 14%), total (− 6%), and free testosterone (− 15%) (all p trend < 0.05). Short adult menstrual length was associated with higher early-follicular total estradiol (< 26 vs. > 31 days = 14%), SHBG (10%), lower luteal estrone (− 8%), progesterone (− 9%), total (− 11%) and free testosterone (− 25%), and androstenedione (− 14%) (all p trend < 0.05). Irregularity of menses at 18–22 was associated with lower early-follicular total (irregular vs. very regular = − 14%) and free estradiol (− 14%), and early-follicular estrone (− 8%) (All p trend < 0.05). Irregularity of adult menstrual cycle was associated with lower luteal total estradiol (irregular vs. very regular = − 8%), SHBG (− 3%), higher total (8%), and free testosterone (11%) (all p trend < 0.05).

Conclusions

Early-life and adulthood menstrual characteristics are moderately associated with mid-to-late reproductive year’s hormone concentrations. These relations of menstrual characteristics with endogenous hormone levels could partially account for associations between menstrual characteristics and reproductive cancers or other chronic diseases.

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Acknowledgments

We gratefully acknowledge the Nurses’ Health Study II participants for their continuing contributions.

Funding

This study was supported by NIH grants UM1 CA176726, CA67262, CA138580, and CA50385.

Author information

Author notes

  1. Leslie V Farland and Fan Mu have contributed equal as first author.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Epidemiology, Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, MA, USA

    Leslie V. Farland, Fan Mu, A. Heather Eliassen, Susan E. Hankinson, Shelley S. Tworoger & Stacey A. Missmer

  2. Department of Obstetrics, Gynecology, and Reproductive Biology, Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School, 221 Longwood Ave, Boston, MA, 02115, USA

    Leslie V. Farland, Robert L. Barbieri & Stacey A. Missmer

  3. Channing Division of Network Medicine, Department of Medicine, Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA

    A. Heather Eliassen, Susan E. Hankinson, Shelley S. Tworoger & Stacey A. Missmer

  4. Department of Biostatistics and Epidemiology, School of Public Health and Health Sciences, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, MA, USA

    Susan E. Hankinson

  5. Department of Cancer Epidemiology, Moffitt Cancer Center, Tampa, FL, USA

    Shelley S. Tworoger

  6. Academic Department of Biochemistry, The Royal Marsden Hospital, London, UK

    Mitch Dowsett

  7. Department of Oncology, McGill University and Lady Davis Research Institute, Montreal, QC, Canada

    Michael N. Pollak

  8. Division of Adolescent Medicine, Boston Children’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA

    Stacey A. Missmer

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  1. Leslie V. Farland
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Correspondence to Leslie V. Farland.

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Farland, L.V., Mu, F., Eliassen, A.H. et al. Menstrual cycle characteristics and steroid hormone, prolactin, and growth factor levels in premenopausal women. Cancer Causes Control 28, 1441–1452 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10552-017-0971-2

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10552-017-0971-2

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