Psycho-neuro-endocrine Aspects of Climacteric Disorders

Abstract

This study reports various diagnostic and therapeutic procedures of climacteric disorders from three points of view, namely, psychological, neurological and endocrinological.1. Psychological aspects;The patients with climacteric disorders (N=76) and climacteric women (N=87) who have not been regularly treated by the doctors were compared on a variety of symptomatic (Subjective Symptoms Questionnaire), and personality (Egogram, MPI) measures.a) Statistical clustering of the climacteric women in terms of the symptoms;The Subjective Symproms Questionnaire was administered which was based on Kupperman menopause compliants and Self-Rating Questionnaire for Depression. The subjects evuluated the severity of their own symptoms, to which factor analysis was applied. Then, factor scores of each subject were calculated and used for clustering the subjects, employing cluster analysis.b) Personality in climacteric disorders;As the results of Egogram test, the climacteridc women with syndrome tended to be too sensitive to other's opinions and behavior, and to repress their anger. The MPI test showed that the climacteric women with syndrome were more introverted and nervous than the healthy.2. Autonomic nervous function;The correlation between the autonomic nervous fuction test and autonomic nervous symptoms have been studied with plethysmography and autonomic nervous symptom score. A significant difference in the plethysmograms of healthy women and vegetative disturbances has been shown in our investigation.3. Endocrinological treatment;At the present time, the administration of an exogeneous estrogen for the treatment of climacteric disorders is generally accepted. However, there have been several reports to show that estrogen will promote carcinogenecity. The author whould like to propose a reactivation method on functionally declinign ovary by approach of induction of ovulation. The author describes a successful case treated by the new method of hormone therapy.Then, the implications of these results are discussed from the psycho-neuro-endocrine standpoints.