Women’s perspectives of early menopause: development of a word cloud

Abstract

Objective: Early menopause (EM), menopause aged <45 years, occurs spontaneously or secondary to medical treatments and is associated with multiple health impacts. A word cloud is an image where the word size reflects the frequency of use. We aimed to assess the perspectives of women with EM using a word cloud.

Methods: Women diagnosed with EM, recruited from clinics/community, completed a survey including the open-ended question ‘What words do you associate with EM?’. Demographics and medical history were collected. Data analysis included descriptive statistics, identification of word themes/stems/synonyms, word frequency, and chi-square test. A word cloud was constructed from words used by two or more women using ‘Wordle’ (www.wordle.net).

Results: Responses were obtained from 190/263 participants. The mean age was 54 ± 11 years, with EM diagnosed at age 38 ± 5 years. The cause of EM was unknown (30% of women), bilateral oophorectomy (27%), cancer therapy (25%), or autoimmune/genetic/metabolic (17%). The commonest words reported were hot flushes (36.8% of women), mood swings (20.5%), and infertility (16.8%), which varied with age and cause of EM. Few women reported neutral/positive words.

Conclusion: Most words that women associate with EM have negative connotations and refer to symptoms. A word cloud is a novel way to illustrate women’s perspectives.

摘要

目的：早绝经（early menopause , EM), 是指年龄小于45岁绝经, 可以自然发生或继发于药物治疗的, 并与多种健康影响有关。词云是一个图像, 其中单词大小反映了使用频率。我们的目标是使用词云评估EM女性的观点。

方法：从诊所/社区招募的被诊断患有EM的妇女完成了一项调查, 其中包括一个开放式问题：“你把什么词与EM联系在一起？”收集了人口统计学和病史。数据分析包括描述性统计、单词主题/词干/同义词识别、词频和卡方检验。一个词云是由两个或两个以上的女性使用“Wordle”(www.wordle.net)的词构成的。

结果：从190/263名参与者中获得了答复。平均年龄为54±11岁, EM确诊时年龄为38±5岁。引起EM的病因包括：不明原因(30%)、双侧卵巢切除(27%)、治疗癌症(25%)或自身免疫/遗传/代谢疾病(17%)。回答中最常见的词是潮热(36.8%)、情绪波动(20.5%)和不孕症(16.8%), 常见词汇随年龄和EM的发病原因不同而不同。很少有女性应用中性/积极的话语。

结论：大多数女性应用的与EM相关词汇都有负面的含义, 主要是指症状。一个词云是一个新颖的方式来说明妇女的观点。

Keywords:

• Attitude
• early menopause
• premature menopause
• premature ovarian insufficiency
• word cloud

Acknowledgements

Participants in this research were recruited from the Breast Cancer Network Australia (BCNA) Review and Survey Group, a national, online group of Australian women living with breast cancer who are interested in receiving invitations to participate in research. The authors acknowledge the contribution of the women involved in the Review and Survey Group who participated in this project. This research was supported by Register 4 through its members’ participation in research. Part of this study was presented as a poster at the World Congress on Menopause, Vancouver, Canada 2018.

Potential conflict of interest

A. V. is a member of the editorial board of Climacteric.

Additional information

Funding

This study was funded by the National Health and Medical Research Council [Partnership Grant Number: APP 1116008].