Women may experience a decline in memory and learning abilities shortly before the onset of menopause, according to new research.
Researchers from UCLA spent four years studying 2,362 women between the ages of 42 and 52.
The women were given verbal memory, working memory and information processing speed tests at the four stages of the menopause transition premenopause, early perimenopause, late perimenopause and postmenopause.
The researchers found that scores on repeated tests during late perimenopause did not show the same degree of improvement as at the other stages.
“These results concur with prior self-reported memory difficulties [as] 60 percent of women state they have memory problems during the menopause transition,” says Dr. Gail Greendale, a professor of medicine in the division of geriatrics at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA and the studys primary investigator.
“The good news is that the effect of perimenopause on learning seems to be temporary [because our] study found that the amount of learning improved back to premenopausal levels during the postmenopausal stage,” she added.
Some health practitioners have recommended using nutritional supplements, such as those containing ginkgo biloba, to help boost memory.
