Exercise and menstrual dysfunction (original) (raw)
Related papers
Exercise and menstrual function: A review study
Health, 2013
At present there is no conclusive evidence that participation in exercise affects menstruation and is equivocal and unclear whether menstrualtion affects athletic performance. An attempt has therefore been made in this paper to discuss the effects of menstruation on exercise performance and vice versa. The paper reviewed that women experiencing pre-menstrual syndrome will not likely perform well and that menstrual irregularity is much higher in athletes than sedentary women. The paper also reviewed that athletes reach menarche later than sedentary sisters. The review concluded that competing women experiencing premenstrual syndrome might get control over their menstruation through medically recommended low dose oral contraceptive. The paper recommended that athletes experiencing menstrual irregularities and disturbances should seek medical consultation and management before further training.
The Role of Psychosocial Stress in the Etiology of Exercise-Associated Menstrual Disturbances
2017
Background: Low energy availability and psychosocial stress have been shown to suppress reproductive function in mammals independently and in combination. The unique contributions of psychosocial stress on the severity of exercise associated menstrual dysfunction have not been identified and there are few prospective studies that demonstrate such effects. Objectives: To determine the contribution of psychosocial stress to the induction of menstrual disturbances in response to a diet and exercise program that induced modest weight loss. We tested the hypothesis that increases in psychosocial stress were associated with the induction of menstrual disturbances during the original intervention. Design: A secondary analysis was performed on data collected during a prior randomized controlled trial designed to assess the impact of three months of low (8 ± 2%), moderate (22 ± 3%), or high (42 ± 3%) levels of an energy deficit created through varying combinations of controlled caloric restriction and supervised exercise on menstrual function in ovulatory, sedentary women. We tested the hypothesis that increases in psychosocial stress were associated with the induction of menstrual disturbances during the original intervention. Methods: In the original trial, 36 women (age 18-24 yrs, BMI 21-29 kg/m 2) were studied during a Baseline menstrual cycle followed by three successive menstrual cycles during which they exercised 5 d/wk, 50-85% VO2max for 20-75 min and all food was provided to participants according to study group assignment. Metabolic and anthropometric measures were repeated throughout the intervention. Menstrual disturbances (luteal cycle defects, oligomenorrhea, and anovulation) were detected using daily measures of urinary estrone-1-glucuronide (E1G), pregnanediol glucuronide (PdG), mid-cycle luteinizing hormone (LH) and menstrual calendars.
The effect of physical activity across the menstrual cycle on reproductive function
Annals of Epidemiology, 2014
Purpose: To evaluate the association between physical activity (PA) across the menstrual cycle and reproductive function. Methods: The BioCycle Study (2005e2007) followed 259 healthy premenopausal women not using hormonal contraceptives for up to two menstrual cycles (N ¼ 509 cycles). Serum leptin, estradiol, progesterone, luteinizing hormone, follicle-stimulating hormone, and testosterone were measured five to eight times per cycle. Linear mixed models were used to estimate the effect of past-week PA (measured four times during each cycle) on hormone levels. Past-week PA was categorized into tertiles based on metabolic equivalent of task hours per week (cut-points were 15.3 and 35.7). Risk ratios for sporadic anovulation were estimated using generalized linear models. Analyses adjusted for habitual PA (assessed at baseline), body mass index, race, age, and perceived stress. Linear mixed models used inverse probability weights to control for concurrent reproductive hormones and caloric intake. Results: High past-week PA was inversely associated with leptin (À6.6%; 95% confidence interval, À10.6 to À2.5) and luteal phase progesterone (À22.1%; À36.2 to À4.7) as compared with low past-week PA. High past-week PA was not significantly associated with sporadic anovulation (adjusted risk ratio, 1.5; 0.6 to 3.4). Conclusions: High levels of PA were modestly associated with changes in select hormones but not sporadic anovulation among moderate to highly active premenopausal women.
Effects of physical exercise on the female reproductive system
Minerva endocrinologica, 2013
The excess in physical activity could be closely linked to considerable negative consequences on the whole body. These dysfunctions called as "female athlete triad"' by the American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM) include amenorrhea, osteoporosis and disorder eating. The female athlete triad poses serious health risks, both on the short and on the long term, to the overall well-being of affected individuals. Sustained low energy availability can impair health, causing many medical complications within skeletal, endocrine, cardiovascular, reproductive and central nervous system. On the contrary, several studies have shown, that physical activity improves cardiovascular risk factors, hormonal profile and reproductive function. These improvements include a decrease in abdominal fat, blood glucose, blood lipids and insulin resistance, as well as improvements in menstrual cyclicity, ovulation and fertility, decreases in testosterone levels and Free Androgen Index (FAI) an...
Human Reproduction, 2010
background: The identification of subtle menstrual cycle disturbances requires daily hormone assessments. In contrast, the identification of severe menstrual disturbances, such as amenorrhea and oligomenorrhea, can be established by clinical observation. The primary purpose of this study was to determine the frequency of subtle menstrual disturbances, defined as luteal phase defects (LPD) or anovulation, in exercising women, with menstrual cycles of 26-35 days, who engage in a variety of sports, both recreational and competitive. Secondly, the prevalence of oligomenorrhea and amenorrhea was also determined via measurement of daily urinary ovarian steroids rather than self report alone. methods: Menstrual status was documented by daily measurements of estrone and pregnanediol glucuronide and luteinizing hormone across two to three consecutive cycles and subsequently categorized as ovulatory (Ovul), LPD, anovulatory (Anov), oligomenorrheic (Oligo) and amenorrheic (Amen) in sedentary (Sed) and exercising (Ex) women. results: Sed (n ¼ 20) and Ex women (n ¼ 67) were of similar (P . 0.05) age (26.3 + 0.8 years), weight (59.3 + 1.8 kg), body mass index (22.0 + 0.6 kg/m 2 ), age of menarche (12.8 + 0.3 years) and gynecological maturity (13.4 + 0.9 years). The Sed group exercised less (P , 0.001) (96.7 + 39.1 versus 457.1 + 30.5 min/week) and had a lower peak oxygen uptake (34.4 + 1.4 versus 44.3 + 0.6 ml/ kg/min) than the Ex group. Among the menstrual cycles studied in the Sed group, the prevalence of subtle menstrual disturbances was only 4.2% (2/48); 95.8% (46/48) of the observed menstrual cycles were ovulatory. This finding stands in stark contrast to that observed in the Ex group where only 50% (60/120) of the observed menstrual cycles were ovulatory and as many as 50% (60/120) were abnormal. Of the abnormal cycles in the Ex group, 29.2% (35/120) were classified as LPD (short, inadequate or both) and 20.8% (25/120) were classified as Anov. Among the cycles of Ex women with severe menstrual disturbances, 3.5% (3/86) of the cycles were Oligo and 33.7% (29/86) were Amen. No cycles of Sed women (0/20) displayed either Oligo or Amen.
The Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism, 2001
Cross-sectional and short-term prospective studies in humans support the concept that low energy availability, and not other factors associated with exercise, causes the development of exercise-induced reproductive dysfunction. To rigorously test this hypothesis, we performed a longitudinal study, examining the role of low energy availability on both the development and the reversal of exercise-induced amenorrhea, using a monkey model (Macaca fascicularis). Eight adult female monkeys developed amenorrhea (defined as absence of menses for at least 100 d, with low and unchanging concentrations of LH, FSH, E2, and P4) after gradually increasing their daily exercise to 12.3 ؎ 0.9 km/d of running over a 7-to 24-month period. Food intake remained constant during exercise training. To test whether amenorrhea is caused by low energy availability, four of the eight amenorrheic monkeys were provided with supplemental calories (138 -181% of calorie intake during amenorrhea) while they maintained their daily training. All four monkeys exhibited increased reproductive hormone levels and reestablished ovulatory cycles, with recovery times for circulating gonadotropin levels ranging from 12-57 d from the initiation of supplemental feeding. The rapidity of recovery within the reproductive axis in a given monkey was directly related to the amount of energy that was consumed during the period of supplemental feeding (r ؍ ؊0.97; P < 0.05). Repeated measurements of plasma T 3 concentrations, a marker of cellular energy availability, revealed a tight correlation between the changes in reproductive function and T 3 levels, such that T 3 significantly decreased (27%) with the induction and significantly increased (18%) with the reversal of amenorrhea (P < 0.05). These data provide strong evidence that low energy availability plays a causal role in the development of exercise-induced amenorrhea. (J Clin Endocrinol Metab 86: 5184 -5193, 2001)
Impact of Menstrual Function on Hormonal Response to Repeated Bouts of Intense Exercise
Frontiers in Physiology
Background: Strenous exercise stimulates the hypothalamic-pituitary (HP) axis in order to ensure homeostasis and promote anabolism. Furthermore, exercise stimulates a transient increase in the neurotrophin brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) suggested to mediate the anxiolytic effects of exercise. Athletes with secondary functional hypothalamic amenorrhea (FHA) have been reported to have lower BDNF, and a blunted HP axis response to exercise as athletes with overtraining syndrome. Aim: The aim of the study was to investigate the hormonal and BDNF responses to a two-bout maximal exercise protocol with four hours of recovery in between in FHA and eumenorrheic (EUM) athletes. Methods: Eumenorrheic (n = 16) and FHA (n = 14) endurance athletes were recruited from national teams and competitive clubs. Protocols included gynecological examination; body composition (DXA); 7-day assessment of energy availability; blood sampling pre and post the two exercises tests. Results: There were no differences between groups in hormonal responses to the first exercise bout. After the second exercise bout IGFBP-3 increased more in FHA compared with EUM athletes (2.1 ± 0.5 vs. 0.6 ± 0.6 µg/L, p = 0.048). There were non-significant trends toward higher increase in IGF-1 (39.3 ± 4.3 vs. 28.0 ± 4.6 µg/L, p = 0.074), BDNF (96.5 ± 22.9 vs. 34.4 ± 23.5 µg/L, p = 0.058), GH to cortisol ratio (0.329 ± 0.010 vs. 0.058 ± 0.010, p = 0.082), and decrease in IGF-1 to IGFBP-3 ratio (−2.04 ± 1.2 vs. 0.92 ± 1.22, p = 0.081) in athletes with FHA compared with EUM athletes. Furthermore, there was a non-significant trend toward a higher increase in prolactin to cortisol ratio in EUM athletes compared with athletes with FHA (0.60 ± 0.15 vs. 0.23 ± 0.15, p = 0.071). No differences in the hormonal or BDNF responses between the two exercise bouts as a result of menstrual function were found. Conclusion: No major differences in the hormonal or BDNF responses between the two exercise bouts as a result of menstrual function could be detected.
Aerobic Exercise Has Positive Effects on Menstrual Cycle
Jurnal Pendidikan Jasmani dan Olahraga, 2021
The purpose of this study was to determine the effect of aerobic exercise on obese women. The research design used was a pretest-posttest two treatment design. The subjects involved in this study were 22 women divided into 2 groups, including the aerobic exercise group and the zumba group. This study was conducted 3 times a week for 12 weeks with 65-85% intensity of the maximum pulse rate. Menstrual cycle data were obtained using the interview technique and menstrual questionnaire. The results of this study indicated that aerobic exercise and zumba did not affect the menstrual cycle. Although the study data showed no increase or decrease in menstrual cycles after endurance training, overall subjects experienced positive psychological improvements and decreased menstrual pain.This study concludes that aerobic exercise is good to do because it does not affect the menstrual cycle.
Menstrual Disruption with Exercise is not Linked to an Energy Availability Threshold
Medicine and science in sports and exercise, 2017
Chronic reductions in energy availability (EA) suppress reproductive function. A particular calculation of EA quantifies the dietary energy remaining after exercise for all physiological functions. Reductions in LH pulse frequency have been demonstrated when EA using this calculation is < 30 kcal/ kg ffm·d. We determined whether menstrual disturbances (MD) are induced when EA is < 30 kcal/ kg ffm·d. Thirty-five sedentary, ovulatory women 18-24 yr (weight= 59.0 ± 0.8 kg, BMI= 21.8 ± 0.4 kg·m) completed a diet and exercise intervention over three menstrual cycles. Participants were randomized to groups that varied in the magnitude of negative energy balance created by the combination of exercise and energy restriction. MD were determined using daily urinary estrone-1-glucuronide (E1G) and pregnanediol glucuronide (PdG), mid-cycle LH, and menstrual calendars. In a secondary analysis, we calculated EA from energy balance data and tested the association of EA with menstrual disturb...
Effect of Exercise on Reproductive Hormones in Female Athletes
Female athlete who engages in high intensity exercise is at risk as a consequence of hormonal changes which result in menstrual disturbances. Impaired production of gonadotrophins, which leads to luteal phase deficiency and anovulation, is a common hormonal finding with exercise-induced menstrual disturbances. There is a strong agreement in responsibility of low energy availability due to imbalance between energy intake and energy expenditure during exercise to impairment hypothalamus ovarian axis (HPO) and reduction in hypothalamus, gnadotropin hormones and subsequently menstrual disorder. However, increase in stress hormone levels through hypothalamus adrenal axis (HPA) activated by strenuous physical activity has been introduced as a responsible for HPO axis impairment by some other studies. This paper summarized the effect of prolonged or high-intensity exercise in female reproductive hormone and cycle in female athletes and animal models.