Earthquakes can disrupt women’s menstrual cycles: Study

Menstrual cycles can be impacted by natural calamities like earthquakes, according to a new study. While earthquakes are known to destroy food, buildings, the economy, and take lives, they also affect mental health. This recent study has now revealed that earthquakes can also disrupt women’s menstrual cycles.

Studies have shown that the menstrual rhythm declines given the traumatic situation for example an earthquake. Menstruation is associated with hormonal changes and it entails the shedding off of the uterine lining approximately in the time period of 27 when the egg doesn’t fertilise in the ovary. When the monthly cycle follows a simple pattern it means the woman is healthy. However, if it starts to fluctuate or get worse or create more than average pain or high blood pressure, there will always be an issue that might be physical or mental. 

Sibel Kiyak of Necmettin Erbakan University, Turkey said “Earthquakes can disrupt not only physical but also hormonal and psychological balances, which can directly affect women’s reproductive health.”

The research published in the Brain and Behavior scientific journal describes disruption of the menstrual cycle in women who watched two major earthquakes in Turkey. The study’s participants in total were 309 young adults between 18 and 49 years old living in one of the 11 regions that were defined as disaster areas after the February 6, 2023 earthquakes in Kahramanmaraş, Turkey.

Link Between PTSD and Menstrual Cycles Irregularities

The earthquake which occurred earlier this year recorded 7.8 on the Richter scale, claimed over 50000 lives and left well over 110000 injured. Some 38,000 structures fell in the province, and much pressure had been accorded to the resources.

The subjects were required to present the physical and psychological consequences they suffered stemming from the event nine months later. The study revealed more women are experiencing abnormal menstrual periods than before. Pre earthquake, only 14.3% of the women had irregular menstrual cycles and 44.8% reported having irregular cycles post the earthquake.

About the stated problems, women respondents noted 14.6% faced infrequent cycles since the devastating earthquakes, 12.3% heavy bleeding each month, 10.7% over frequent bleeding and 10.7% in between bleeding. Around 22.7% of these women had elevated levels of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), which implies that there is a connection between the irregularities and the trauma  was under immense pressure on the resources.

However, the study has some limitations; first, the study targeted only those women who could read and those with internet access. As much as this study failed to show the disparity in the hormonal changes that related to trauma and reproductive health, the authors of the study noted notable correlations between trauma, hormonal changes, and reproductive health.

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