[Survey of health status and healthcare service demand of perimenopausal women in Guangdong].
OBJECTIVE
To understand the health status and healthcare service demand of perimenopausal women in Guangdong Province so as to explore the mode and methods for implementing climacteric and senectitude healthcare.


METHODS
Using the method of stratified and cluster sampling and according to the geographical features of Guangdong Province, we selected 4 500 perimenopausal women aged 40-65 years from 5 relatively small cities (representatives of the urban areas) and 4 counties (representatives of the rural areas) for this survey.


RESULTS
The average age of natural menopause was 48.6 years in this cohort of women, and was 48.9 years in women from the urban areas and 48.3 years in those from the rural areas. The total incidence of diseases was similar in the urban and rural areas (38.5% vs 39.5%), accounting for an incidence of 39% in the total subjects. The 6 most prevalent diseases were bone and joint disease (12.5%), hypertension (9.2%), myoma of the uterus (6.8%), gastric or duodenal ulcer (5.2%), cardiac disease (2.7%) and diabetes mellitus (2.2%). In bone and joint disease, knee joint disease and lumbar vertebrae disease were the commonest (34.3% vs 32.8%), and the incidence of bone fracture was 2.5%. Perimenopausal syndrome had a prevalence rate of 68.1%, and the most distressful symptoms were sleeplessness, muscular, bone and joint pain, fidgety, dizziness, of which 86.8% were mental symptoms and 86.0% body symptoms. Women(71.2%) with perimenopausal symptoms received no medical treatment, and only 20.5% had ever sought medical care in the department of obstetrics and gynecology, often taking traditional Chinese medicines (53.9%). Only 1.4% of the symptomatic women received hormone therapy, the rate varied from 1.0% in the rural areas to 1.8% in the urban areas.


CONCLUSIONS
Perimenopausal syndrome and its related diseases severely affect the physical and mental health of perimenopausal women, who demand extensive healthcare services.
Tian
Feng-lian
FL
Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Guangdong Provincial Institute of Maternal and Child Healthcare, Guangzhou 510010, China. tfl@163.com
Yang
Dong-zi
DZ
Zhang
Xiao-zhuang
XZ
Zhao
Qing-guo
QG
Zhan
Xin-lin
XL
Li
Rong-han
RH
Mu
Li
L
Jiang
Xue-fang
XF
Li
Jie-ming
JM
D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D002681:China; D002979:Climacteric / Q000502:physiology / Q000523:psychology; D005260:Female; D006301:Health Services Needs and Demand; D006304:Health Status; D006801:Humans; D008875:Middle Aged; D047648:Perimenopause / Q000502:physiology* / Q000523:psychology; D012423:Rural Health; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D014504:Urban Health; D016387:Women's Health