Perceptions of Indian women regarding menstruation

Although menstruation is still considered a natural event by women in India, perceptions about menstruation are changing. We report on our study of 1150 urban and 850 rural women. The urban women included high school and college students, professional women, and housewives. A 10-point questionnaire was pretested in a clinic setting and then administered to the study group. The responses show that 80% of high school and college students and professional women wish to have infrequent menses or no menses at all. In contrast, 70% of rural women prefer to have monthly menses. The authors wish to initiate a debate on this issue among health care providers and women's groups.