The relationship between menstrual disorders and education in women with intractable epilepsy

Abstract

OBJECTIVE: The study aimed to investigate the relationship between menstrual disorders and education in women with intractable epilepsy. METHOD: This was a descriptive-analytical study. Statistical population consisted of all female patients with intractable epilepsy in 15-45 age group who visited the third department of epilepsy in Ayatollah Kashani Hospital. The sample size was 380. They were selected using simple random sampling. A questionnaire was distributed among the patients to collect information on education, incidence and type of current menstrual disorder (each type of menstrual disorder was explained to the participants). Then, the relationship between education and prevalence of menstrual disorders in these women was investigated. FINDINGS: Analysis of Spearman correlation coefficient showed a significant and negative correlation between education and menstrual disorder (P≤0.05). Analysis of multivariate logistic regression also showed a significant relationship between education and types of menstrual disorders. There was also a significant relationship between education and regular and irregular menstruation (P≤0.05). CONCLUSION: There is a significant relationship between education and menstrual disorders in women with intractable epilepsy, and the higher education level indicates less prevalent menstrual irregularities.