Premenstrual Disorders Linked With Increased Cardiovascular Disease Risk
Investigators said they hope the findings contribute to greater awareness that premenstrual disorders can have long-term health consequences.
Women who have been diagnosed with premenstrual disorders are at an increased risk for developing cardiovascular diseases (CVD), according to data published in Nature Cardiovascular Research.1 Authors of the study said the findings suggest health care providers should be aware of the heightened risk when treating women with premenstrual disorders.
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Premenstrual disorders include premenstrual syndrome and premenstrual dysphoric disorder. They are marked by recurring emotional and physical symptoms before menstruation and impact a significant number of women. Although the exact causes remain unclear, research points to an abnormal sensitivity to natural hormonal fluctuations as a key factor, underscoring the complex and often underrecognized impact on women’s health and quality of life.1
“CVDs are the leading cause of mortality among females,” the authors wrote. “Beyond CVD risk conferred by traditional risk factors, women may face an additional risk attributable to reproductive history. However, current efforts did not adequately capture female-specific risk factors, and identification of more female-specific risk factors may help improve risk profiling and prediction of CVDs among females.”
A team of investigators from the Institute of Environmental Medicine at the Karolinska Institutet conducted a cohort study to examine the association between premenstrual disorders and the subsequent risk of CVDs. Data for the study was gathered from national registers in Sweden from 2001 to 2022. A sibling cohort was included to address familial confounding.
The study cohort included 99411 women with premenstrual disorders in the population cohort and 36061 in the sibling cohort. The median age was 35.4 years for the population cohort and 34.6 years for the sibling cohort. Women with premenstrual disorders were more likely to have a higher educational level, higher parity, a higher prevalence of disease history and were also more likely to use hormonal contraceptives or hormone replacement therapy.
The study found that women with premenstrual disorders had a higher risk of developing any CVD compared to women without premenstrual disorders. A stronger association was seen in women with premenstrual disorders that started before the age of 25, 30 and 35, and for those who had perinatal depression. Similar results were also seen across the sibling cohort.
The most common forms of CVD among the women with premenstrual disorders included hypertensive diseases, essential hypertension, ischemic heart disease, cerebrovascular disease, ischemic stroke and arrhythmia. The strongest associations were found for arrhythmia in the population cohort and for ischemic stroke in the sibling cohort.
“Our results need to be replicated in other populations, and healthcare professionals can be aware of the potential CVD risk when managing women with premenstrual disorders,” the authors concluded. “In addition, if the results are confirmed in other populations, premenstrual disorders may be considered as a factor for future CVD risk stratification and prediction among women in the real world.”
“We hope that our findings will contribute to greater awareness that premenstrual disorders not only affect daily life but can also have consequences for long-term health,” Donghao Lu, an author of the study, said in a release.2
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References
1. Yang Y, Bränn E, Zhou J, et al. Premenstrual disorders and risk of cardiovascular diseases. Nat Cardiovasc Res (2025). https://doi.org/10.1038/s44161-025-00684-4
2. Premenstrual symptoms linked to increased risk of cardiovascular disease. News Release. Karolinka Institutet. July 11, 2025. Accessed July 14, 2025. https://news.ki.se/premenstrual-symptoms-linked-to-increased-risk-of-cardiovascular-disease
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