The Manitoba Project: a re-examination of the link between menopause and depression.

This paper re-examines the association between menopause and depression using data from a study in which 477 women were interviewed 6 times over a 3-year period. Menopause is examined as one of a series of factors which may increase the risk of depression for women in middle age, such as children leaving home, the death and illness of family members, the stresses of daily living, health and the onset of chronic disease. Rather than hormonal changes, it seems to be her health coupled with the shifts and stresses of family life in a woman's menopausal years which may trigger her depression.

Culture and symptom reporting at menopause.

The purpose of the present paper is to review recent research on the relationship of culture and menopausal symptoms and propose a biocultural framework that makes use of both biological and cultural parameters in future research. Medline was searched for English-language articles published from 2000 to 2004 using the keyword 'menopause' in the journals--Menopause, Maturitas, Climacteric, Social Science and Medicine, Medical Anthropology Quarterly, Journal of Women's Health, Journal of the American Medical Association, American Journal of Epidemiology, Lancet and British Medical Journal, excluding articles concerning small clinical samples, surgical menopause or HRT. Additionally, references of retrieved articles and reviews were hand-searched.