title: Prevalence of menopausal symptoms in Asian midlife women: a systematic review.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To systematically review published articles for the prevalence of menopausal symptoms in Asian women.
  
  
  METHODS
  A comprehensive and systematic literature search was performed using MEDLINE, EMBASE, PsycINFO, CINAHL, SCOPUS and Google scholar in June 2013 to retrieve all English-language studies that included information on the prevalence of menopausal symptoms in women living in Asian countries. Risk of bias of included studies was assessed using a risk-of-bias tool explicitly designed for the systematic review of prevalence studies.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Twenty-three independent studies met our inclusion criteria. Physical symptoms were the most prevalent symptoms compared to psychological, vasomotor and sexual symptoms. There was a wide variation in the prevalence of all symptoms across the menopausal stages due to the differences in modes of recruitment, study design, sampling procedures, the time frame over which symptoms were assessed and use of different diagnostic or screening tools. A high level of bias was observed for both external and internal validity for most studies.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Although there is a wide variation in the reported prevalence of menopausal symptoms, physical symptoms predominate, followed by psychological symptoms, vasomotor symptoms and sexual symptoms. Further studies of representative samples are necessary to understand whether the variations in prevalence reporting are a function of methodological issues or due to ethnic, cultural or other socioeconomic differences.
authors: Women's Health Research Program, School of Public Health and Preventive Medicine, Monash University , Melbourne, Victoria , Australia.
authors: M Rakibul
authors: MR
authors: Islam
authors: P
authors: P
authors: Gartoulla
authors: R J
authors: RJ
authors: Bell
authors: P
authors: P
authors: Fradkin
authors: S R
authors: SR
authors: Davis
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D001208:Asia / Q000453:epidemiology; D044466:Asian People; D003072:Cognition Disorders / Q000453:epidemiology; D003469:Culture; D005006:Ethnicity; D005260:Female; D019584:Hot Flashes / Q000453:epidemiology; D006801:Humans; D016239:MEDLINE; D008593:Menopause / Q000502:physiology / Q000523:psychology; D001523:Mental Disorders / Q000453:epidemiology; D008875:Middle Aged; D010146:Pain / Q000453:epidemiology; D012735:Sexual Dysfunction, Physiological / Q000453:epidemiology; D012893:Sleep Wake Disorders / Q000453:epidemiology; D012959:Socioeconomic Factors; D013546:Sweating
keywords: ASIAN WOMEN; MENOPAUSAL SYMPTOMS; MIDLIFE; PREVALENCE; SYSTEMATIC REVIEW