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Teenage period pain linked to higher risk of chronic pain in adulthood

Teenagers who experience moderate or severe period pain are significantly more likely to develop chronic pain in adulthood – including pain beyond the pelvis – according to a major new study from the University of Oxford, funded by the Medical Research Foundation.

A teenager is taking a sanitary pad from her school bag.

As children and young people return to school this week, the findings offer a timely reminder of the urgent need to take adolescent menstrual pain seriously and improve the support available to young people.

Published in The Lancet Child & Adolescent Health, the study is the first large-scale investigation into how painful periods (dysmenorrhoea) in adolescence are linked to pain in young adulthood.

 

Key points about the study:

  • Data from 1,157 participants in the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC)
  • Period pain recorded at age 15; chronic pain assessed at age 26
  • Severe adolescent period pain = 76% higher relative risk of chronic pain in adulthood; moderate pain = 65% higher relative risk compared to no period pain
  • As severity of adolescent period pain increased, the risk of developing chronic pain increased
  • Chronic pain included headaches, back pain, joint pain, abdominal pain, and other non-pelvic sites
  • First large-scale, UK population-based evidence of the link

 

Read the full story on the Nuffield Department of Women's & Reproductive Health website. 

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