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Is 3alpha-androstenol pheromone related to menstrual synchrony?

Jahanfar S, Awang CH, Rahman RA, Samsuddin RD, See CP

J Fam Plann Reprod Health Care, 2007 Apr;33(2):116-8.
PMID: 17407681

The ovarian cycles of females living and interacting together may synchronise due to pheromones released from axillary secretary glands, the highest concentration of which is produced in the mid-follicular phase, prior to ovulation. The objective of this study was to find evidence for menstrual synchrony in a group of female students living together and to obtain a correlation between the ability to smell the putative pheromone, 5alpha-androst-16-en-3alpha-ol (3alpha-androstenol), found in apocrine secretions and menstrual synchrony. This cross-sectional study involved 88 students who completed a standard questionnaire and whose sense of smell was measured using ten varying thresholds. The menstrual history, friendship scale and menstrual hygiene score was determined for the participants.

Matched MeSH terms: Menstrual Cycle/physiology*
Fulltext Menstrual Factors, Reproductive History, Hormone Use, and Urothelial Carcinoma Risk: A Prospective Study in the EPIC Cohort

Lujan-Barroso L, Botteri E, Caini S, Ljungberg B, Roswall N, Tjønneland A, et al.

Cancer Epidemiol Biomarkers Prev, 2020 Aug;29(8):1654-1664.
PMID: 32467345 DOI: 10.1158/1055-9965.EPI-20-0184

BACKGROUND: Urothelial carcinoma is the predominant (95%) bladder cancer subtype in industrialized nations. Animal and epidemiologic human studies suggest that hormonal factors may influence urothelial carcinoma risk.
METHODS: We used an analytic cohort of 333,919 women from the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition Cohort. Associations between hormonal factors and incident urothelial carcinoma (overall and by tumor grade, tumor aggressiveness, and non-muscle-invasive urothelial carcinoma) risk were evaluated using Cox proportional hazards models.
RESULTS: During a mean of 15 years of follow-up, 529 women developed urothelial carcinoma. In a model including number of full-term pregnancies (FTP), menopausal status, and menopausal hormone therapy (MHT), number of FTP was inversely associated with urothelial carcinoma risk (HR≥5vs1 = 0.48; 0.25-0.90; P trend in parous women = 0.010) and MHT use (compared with nonuse) was positively associated with urothelial carcinoma risk (HR = 1.27; 1.03-1.57), but no dose response by years of MHT use was observed. No modification of HRs by smoking status was observed. Finally, sensitivity analyses in never smokers showed similar HR patterns for the number of FTP, while no association between MHT use and urothelial carcinoma risk was observed. Association between MHT use and urothelial carcinoma risk remained significant only in current smokers. No heterogeneity of the risk estimations in the final model was observed by tumor aggressiveness or by tumor grade. A positive association between MTH use and non-muscle-invasive urothelial carcinoma risk was observed.
CONCLUSIONS: Our results support that increasing the number of FTP may reduce urothelial carcinoma risk.
IMPACT: More detailed studies on parity are needed to understand the possible effects of perinatal hormone changes in urothelial cells.

Matched MeSH terms: Menstrual Cycle/physiology*
Menstrual characteristics associated with endometriosis

Arumugam K, Lim JM

Br J Obstet Gynaecol, 1997 Aug;104(8):948-50.
PMID: 9255089

This case-controlled study investigates whether the presence of menstrual characteristics, which may increase the exposure of the peritoneal cavity to retrograde menstruation, increases the risk of developing endometriosis. The menstrual characteristics considered were 1. age at menarche of less than 12 years, 2. duration of menstrual flow greater than five days and 3. menstrual cycle lengths of < 28 days. The frequency with which these menstrual characteristics occurred in 305 women with proven endometriosis was compared with their frequency in 305 age-matched women without endometriosis. Adjusting for the confounding factors of parity, age at first childbirth and social class, the only menstrual characteristic that was significantly associated with endometriosis was menstrual cycle lengths of less than 28 days (odds ratio 1.83; 95% confidence intervals 1.60-2.55). There was insufficient evidence to conclude that the presence of menstrual characteristics which may increase the exposure of the peritoneal cavity to retrograde menstruation, increase a women's risk of developing endometriosis. The association of short menstrual cycle lengths with endometriosis may have been consequential rather than causal.

Matched MeSH terms: Menstrual Cycle/physiology*
Fulltext Stress and female reproductive function: a study of daily variations in cortisol, gonadotrophins, and gonadal steroids in a rural Mayan population

Nepomnaschy PA, Welch K, McConnell D, Strassmann BI, England BG

Am J Hum Biol, 2004 Sep-Oct;16(5):523-32.
PMID: 15368600 DOI: 10.1002/ajhb.20057

We report here on a longitudinal study of stress and women's reproduction in a small Kaqchikel Mayan community in rural Guatemala. Current understanding of the effects of stress on the reproductive axis in women is mostly derived from clinical studies of individual stressors. Little is known, however, about the cumulative effects of "real life" stress. Cortisol increases in response to a broad variety of individual stressors (Tilbrook et al., 2002). In this article, we evaluate the association between daily fluctuations in women's urinary cortisol and reproductive hormones: estrone conjugates (E(1)C), pregnandiol glucuronide (PdG), luteinizing hormone (LH), and follicle stimulating hormone (FSH). To assess the association between daily changes in cortisol levels and changes in the profiles of the reproductive hormones, we used a random coefficients model based on polynomial regression. The sample includes 92 menstrual cycles provided by 24 participants over a year-long prospective study. Increases in urinary cortisol levels were associated with significant increases in gonadotrophin and progestin levels during the follicular phase. Also, in a time window between days 4 and 10 after ovulation, increased cortisol levels were associated with significantly lower progestin levels. These results are significant because untimely increases in gonadotrophins and low midluteal progesterone levels have previously been reported to impinge on the ovulatory and luteinization processes and to reduce the chances of successful implantation (Ferin, 1999; Baird et al., 1999). Future research should consider the possibility that stress may affect fecundability and implantation without necessarily causing amenorrhoea or oligomenorrhoea.

Matched MeSH terms: Menstrual Cycle/physiology*