Heritability of menopausal age in mothers and daughters.

Objective: To determine the heritability of age at natural menopause from mother-daughter pairs.

Design: Two-generation families were selected to study heritability of menopausal age.

Setting: Subjects were drawn from a population-based study.

Patient(s): One hundred sixty-four mother-daughter pairs with a natural menopausal age.

Intervention(s): None.

Main Outcome Measure(s): The heritability of age at natural menopause estimated by a random-effects model.

Result(s): A heritability of 44% (95% confidence interval, 36%, 50%) was estimated.

Conclusion(s): This study confirms that heritable components largely determine the natural age at menopause. Reasons for the differences between heritability estimates based on sibling pairs and parent-child comparisons are discussed.