Half of Menopausal Women Have Low Sexual Desire
Jul 19, 2008 RESEARCH TRIANGLE PARK, N.C. -– Menopausal women have lower sexual desire than women who have not yet gone through menopause, according to a new study by researchers at RTI International, The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and Proctor & Gamble.
The study, published in the July 14 issue of Archives of Internal Medicine, studied almost 2,000 U.S. women ages 30 to 70 who were in stable relationships. It found that more than 50 percent of women who went through menopause naturally and almost 40 percent of women who went through menopause by having surgery to remove their ovaries had a prevalence of low sexual desire, compared with 26 percent of women who had not gone through menopause.
Interestingly, women who went through menopause naturally exhibited the lowest distress about their lower sexual desire.
"Women who go through menopause naturally may continue to produce some hormones that are beneficial for sexual response whereas women whose ovaries are removed are not producing these reproductive hormones," said Suzanne West, Ph.D., M.P.H., a senior public health researcher at RTI and the study's lead author. "In addition, naturally menopausal women have more time to adjust physically to the hormonal changes, and may also be expecting changes in their sexual response that reduces their distress about their low sexual desire."
The researchers found that distress about low sexual desire was more than twice as prevalent among surgically menopausal women as women who have not yet gone through menopause. The distress was particularly highest among women who were younger than 45 years of age when they had their ovaries removed.
According to the authors' estimates using current census data, at least 16 million women who are 50 or older currently experience low sexual desire and about 4 million are distressed by their low desire.
The study, funded by Procter & Gamble, was conducted while West was working in the Department of Epidemiology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Sex,
Society, And The Internet
View Printer Friendly Version
Email Article to Friend
Reader Comments