Menopausal symptoms negatively affect work ability

(HealthDay) -- Menopausal symptoms negatively affect work ability, according to research published in the March issue of Menopause.

To determine whether menopausal symptoms affect a woman's work ability, Marije Geukes, M.D., of the Nij Smellinge Hospital in Drachten, Netherlands, and colleagues conducted a cross-sectional survey of 208 healthy working Dutch women aged 44 to 60 years. The Work Ability Index (WAI) was used to measure work ability, and the Greene Climacteric Scale (GCS) was used to assess menopausal symptoms.

The researchers found that there was a significant negative association between the total GCS score and the WAI score, with the total GCS score predicting 33.8 percent of the total variance in the WAI. In multiple linear regression analysis, only the psychological and somatic subscales of the GCS score were significant predictors, and together they accounted for 36.5 percent of the WAI variance.

"This is the first study to use the WAI to examine the impact of menopausal factors on work ability. Menopausal symptoms are negatively associated with work ability. These findings suggest that menopausal symptoms may increase the risk of sickness absence, although this would need to be investigated in a future study," the authors write.

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