Age at menarche and menstrual problems among school-going adolescent girls of a North Indian district

Abstract

Background: Menstruation and related problems are difficult issues for adolescent girls and are a common reason for consulting healthcare providers. Objectives: To study age at menarche and menstrual problems among school girls in Lucknow district of north India. Materials and Methods: A cross-sectional study was carried out in urban as well as rural schools of Lucknow district from October 2008 to September 2009. Multistage random sampling was used to select the requisite number of girls. A total of 847 school-going adolescent girls between 10 and 19 years of age were interviewed and examined. Statistical analyses were done using percentage and Chi-square test. Results: Out of 847 adolescent girls, 76.7% (650) girls had attained menarche. The overall mean age at menarche was 12.84 (1.4) years. The age at menarche and duration of menstrual flow were significantly associated with place of schools. About one-fourth of the girls in all the three age groups (10-13, 14-16 and 17-19 years) had irregular menstrual cycle. Overall, 73.7% (479/650) girls had dysmenorrhea, with 74.3% (323/435) girls in urban schools and 72.6% (156/215) girls in rural schools. There was no significant association between reproductive tract illnesses and place of schools. Conclusion: Menstruation is an important milestone for adolescent girls and menstrual problems are common among adolescent girls. So, there is a need to explain everything correctly about menstruation. It was suggested that a strong need exists for strong health educational activities among the adolescent girls, their parents, and teachers for effective management of menstrual problems among all adolescent girls.

A study of menstrual pattern and prevalence of dysmenorrhea during menstruation among school going adolescent girls in Lucknow district, Uttar Pradesh, India

“…This is similar to observation by Sachan et al 5 were dysmenorrhoea was seen in 73.7% of girls. Almost similar finding was reported by Agarwal et al 11 in adolescent girls (79.6%).…”

“…As the girls of urban schools in my study area were more oriented in academic activities than the girls of rural schools leading to stress. Similar finding was observed by Sachan et al, 5 where menstrual cycle irregularity was 24.7% in urban school girls and 18.1%. in rural school girls.…”

“…This observation is somewhat similar to Sachan et al 5 and Sharma et al 8 who reported that irregular cycle was observed in 22.6% and 31.8% girls respectively. Although irregular cycles is a common finding in adolescents, as the initial cycles are anovulatory which results in abnormal uterine bleeding However Singh et al 9 and Deo et al 10 in their study found that the irregular menstrual cycle was present only in 2.3 % and 6.6% of school girls respectively.…”

Effect of Planned Health Educational Program on Menstrual Knowledge and Practices among Adolescent Saudi Girls

“…This result comes in accordance to the results from other studies conducted in North Indian District, which illustrated that the menarche mean age was 12.84 ± 1.4 years [13]. Another study done at El-Mansoura city [12,14], Egypt, the mean age of menarche was 12.9 years.…”

A cross sectional study on the knowledge, attitudes and practices towards menstrual cycle and its problems: a comparative study of government and non-government adolescent school girls

“…27 In our study we found that the majority of girls of government school were using clothes (36.8%) or both clothes and sanitary pads (35.6%) as an absorbent material during their menstrual cycle. This situation was a little better in the non-government school girls where the percentage of girls using sanitary pads alone was 65.2%; though 25.2% girls were still making use of both clothes and sanitary pads.…”