Psychiatric and social aspects of premenstrual complaint

A number of fundamental methodological problems exist in the area of premenstrual symptomatology and psychiatric ill-health. In the study described these have all been taken into account. The study has been so designed as to make expressly clear the definition of premenstrual complaint being employed and material gathered by means of a retrospective questionnaire is checked by means of an interview administered to a sub-sample and the use of a menstrual diary (Sampson & Jenner, 1977; Dalton, 1978). The use of an interview also permits a careful check to be made of the accuracy displayed by women asked to estimate their particular position in the menstrual cycle at the time of completion of the questionnaire. The use of the premenstrual interview, together with a standardized, semi-structured psychiatric interview specifically designed for the population under study, and a standardized, semi-structured social maladjustment schedule, permits a detailed assessment of the inter-relationship between premenstrual, psychiatric and social variables. Finally, the use of a general practice sample of women attending their general practitioners for many and varied reasons, together with a sample of women drawn from attenders at a specialized premenstrual tension treatment clinic, permits a comparison to be made between the symptom profiles of women in a general practice population who have not overtly identified themselves to the treatment agencies as premenstrual sufferers with a group of women who have so identified themselves. In this way, a more accurate estimate of the numbers of women in general practice samples who manifest a degree of premenstrual complaint equivalent to that shown by special treatment clinic attenders can be achieved.