ESPE Abstracts

Introduction: Menarche is the time of first menstrual bleed and it occurs, on average, 2 to 2.5 years after the onset of puberty. Globally, the age of menarche had been reduced since the last century.

Objective: To examine the evolution of the age of menarche over the last decades and inter-regional variability in an autonomous community located in northern Spain which is divided in eight health areas.

These health areas differ between them from predominance of rural or urban environments.

Material and Methods: A retrospective, descriptive studio was made. We revised the age of menarche of girls and teenagers born between 1920 and 2008, in the eight health areas. These data were collected from clinical records and electronic medical history from ninety public primary health centers of all health areas of the region.

We did two analysis. First, birth decade was compared with age at menarche. Second in the teenagers born between 1998 and 2008, the age of menarche was compared with the health area to which they belonged.

Results:

The second analysis showed differences in the mean age at menarche by health area, ranged between 11.78 (0.87) years in the most rural area to 11.55 (0.92) years in the most industrialized area (P<0,05).

Conclusions: • The average menarcheal age decreased through the last decades. It is probably due to both genetic and environmental factors.

• The differences found in the mean age of menarche by belonging health area were statistically significant but maybe they aren't clinically significant. In order to know the influence of environmental factors over the onset of the menarche, a more detailed study should be performed.