Age at menarche and depression: results from the NHANES 2005-2016

The association between early age at menarche and depression among adolescent girls and adult women has been examined in many studies. However, inconsistent results and limitations such as small sample size, low generalizability, and measurement error exist. We aimed to address these issues to assess the association between age at menarche and depressive symptoms in a nationally representative sample of US women aged 18 years and older.

We used the 2005-2016 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) data with a total of 15,674 women aged 18 years and older included in our study. Logistic regression models were used after adjusting for sociodemographic and health-related factors.

The crude-adjusted model suggests that women with early age of menarche had 1.36 (95% CI [1.16-1.61]) times the odds of current depressive symptoms compared with the normal menarche group, after controlling for age, race/ethnicity, education, poverty income ratio (PIR) and marital status. In the fully-adjusted model, women with early menarche had 1.25 (95% CI [1.05-1.48]) times the odds of current depressive symptoms, after additionally adjusting for smoking status and body mass index (BMI). However, no significant difference was observed between the normal and late menarche groups.

Further studies are warranted to determine the causal relationship and mechanisms between early menarche and increased risk of depression.