Abstract
The association of female reproductive factors (FRFs) with cardiovascular risk factors among different population was variable and inconsistent. The objective of this study was to examine the association between FRFs and hypertension, type 2 diabetes mellitus (DM), and long heart-rate-corrected QT interval (LQTc) in Chinese post-menopausal women (Post-MW). A total of 8046 Post-MW from the China Chaoshan Biobank Cohort Study were included for analysis. Logistic regression and general linear regression models were used to estimate the association between FRFs and hypertension, DM, and LQTc. Compared with women with 0 or 1 live birth, increasing risk of hypertension (odds ratio [OR], 1.51; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.16–1.96), DM (OR, 1.65; 95% CI, 1.22–2.22), and LQTc (OR, 1.45; 95% CI, 1.01–2.09) were observed in women who had five or more live births. Further analysis demonstrated that the association between parity and hypertension, DM, and LQTc was mediated by lifestyle and dyslipidemia. Women with more live births had increased body mass index and waist circumstance, and were inclined to consume more salty food, animal fat, and alcohol, but less meat, vegetable, fish, plant oil, and tea, compared with that had fewer live births (all P < 0.05).
Highlights
Premature menopause has been associated with elevated CVD risk[6]
The overall prevalence of hypertension, diabetes mellitus (DM), and long heart-rate-corrected QT (QTc) interval (LQTc) among post-menopausal women (Post-MW) of south China were 54.59%, 19.37%, and 9.26%, respectively, and it increased with age (Table 2)
Using data from the China Chaoshan Biobank Cohort Study, we observed that the prevalence of hypertension (54.59%) and DM (19.37%) in this Post-MW was higher than that reported for women in other regions of China[14,15]
Summary
Premature menopause has been associated with elevated CVD risk[6]. Observational studies show that Post-MW using hormone replacement therapy (HRT) has a greatly reduced risk of CVD7. Studies that explored the role of surrogate measures of endogenous estrogen, such as parity[9,10] and age at menarche[11,12], on risk of CVD provided conflicting conclusion. Interpretations of these conflicting studies are complicated by varying control for ethnicity, socioeconomic status (SES), lifestyle, and other potentially confounding factors. Hypertension, type 2 diabetes mellitus (hereafter referred to as diabetes mellitus, DM), and long heart-rate-corrected QT (QTc) interval (LQTc)[13] are the established cardiovascular risk factors (CRFs) and associated with increased CVD morbidity and mortality. Age at menarche and menopause, parity, way of menopause, and menstrual cycle length, bleeding duration in reproductive age are the major components of FRFs in our study
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