Health & Fitness
10 Years of the Pill or Later in Life Pregnancies Aid the Aging Brain, Study Finds
Women who menstruate young, use hormonal contraception at length or had late pregnancies apparently fair better cognitively after menopause.
Women have better brain power after menopause if they had their last baby after age 35, used hormonal contraceptives for more than 10 years or began their menstrual cycle before turning 13, USC researchers reported Thursday.
The findings stem from the first study to investigate the association between age at last pregnancy, which can be a marker of a later surge of pregnancy-related hormones, and cognitive function in later life, according to the Keck School of Medicine of USC.
"Based on the findings, we would certainly not recommend that women wait until they're 35 to close their family, but the study provides strong evidence that there is a positive association between later age at last pregnancy and late-life cognition," said Roksana Karim, an assistant professor of clinical preventive medicine and lead author of the study.
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Postmenopausal women who had their last pregnancy after 35 were found to have better verbal memory. Those who had their first pregnancy when they were 24 or older had significantly better executive function, which includes attention control, working memory, reasoning and problem solving.
The main hormones at play are estrogen and progesterone. In animal studies, estrogen has a beneficial impact on brain chemistry, function and structure; progesterone is linked with growth and development of brain tissue, Karim said.
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The study, published this month in the Journal of the American Geriatrics Society, includes 830 women who, on average, were 60 years old. The data was adjusted for age, race and ethnicity, income and education.
Participants were given a series of tests that included assessments of verbal memory -- remembering a list of words or retelling a story after some distraction -- psychomotor speed, attention and concentration, planning, visual perception and memory.
Previous research has shown that many women experience brain power and memory declines in their postmenopausal years. An outpouring of estrogen and progesterone, especially in later life, appears to be beneficial, Karim said.
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