Depression risk may fall after women's periods end

Some women who are depressed as they move toward menopause may notice their symptoms fading or disappearing after a few years, a new study suggests.

Researchers found the proportion of women who reported having depression symptoms dropped consistently, starting 10 years before they had their final menstrual period until eight years after.

"If this is a condition that seems to appear in conjunction with approaching menopause, it may be time limited and the risk may really diminish to low levels once they pass menopause," Ellen Freeman, the study's lead author, said.

Freeman is a research professor at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine in Philadelphia.

Previous studies found women have a higher risk of depression as they enter menopause, the researchers write in JAMA Psychiatry. But little was known about what happened after a woman stopped getting her menstrual periods altogether.

Freeman and her colleagues studied 203 women between the ages of 35 and 48 who had not gone through menopause in 1996. They followed the women through 2010.

Unpredictable hormone fluctuations plus stress, body image, sexuality, infertility, or aging - any one or a combination of these causes emotional distress that may result in mood swings or, in more severe cases, depression. Determining the cause and extent of your “menopause blues” is very important.

3 Types of Depression

"Depressed" and "depression" are words used to describe three distinctly different conditions:

A depressed mood - This is a normal, brief period of feeling blue or sad that is commonly experienced and rarely requires treatment. The medical term is dysphoria.

Depression as a symptom - Sometimes called an adjustment reaction, this type of depression may be due to a wide variety of medical or psychological problems, or to intense reactions to life events (such as divorce, losing a job, death of a loved one). It is usually short term and most often does not require treatment, although it can progress to clinical depression. The medical term for depression that occurs most of the day, more days than not, for at least 2 years is dysthymia.

Clinical depression - This is a disorder believed to result from a chemical imbalance in the brain. A clinical (major) depression requires treatment.

Women completed a questionnaire every so often to determine if they were depressed.

At the beginning of the study, about 40 percent of them scored high enough on the scale of depression symptoms to show they had at least mild or moderate depression, the researchers found.

Starting a decade before their last menstrual period, women's risk of depression fell about 15 percent every year during the study.