Original article Menopause-specific quality of life of urban women in West Bengal, India Nivedita Som* and Subha Ray † *Biological Anthropology Unit, Indian Statistical Institute, 203, B.T. Road, Kolkata 700108, India; † Department of Anthropology, University of Calcutta, Kolkata, India Correspondence: Nivedita Som. Email: nivsom.som@gmail.com Abstract Objective. To find out the association of menopause-specific quality of life of women with both working status and duration of postmenopausal years. Study design. We conducted a cross-sectional study on 250 postmenopausal women belonging to Bengali- speaking Hindu ethnic group, aged 47–62 years in the city of Kolkata, West Bengal, India. The participants were literate, living in wedlock with at least one surviving child, attained natural menopause at least two years ago and have never taken hormone replacement treatment. Menopause-specific quality of life was measured using a self-administered standard questionnaire (Menopause-Specific Quality of Life questionnaire, or MENQOL). MENQOL consisted of 29 menopausal symptoms (items) that are grouped under four domains. Additional information on sociodemographic aspect and reproductive history of the participants were col- lected using a pretested questionnaire. Main outcome measures. Both bivariate and multivariate analyses showed that menopause-specific quality of life decreases with the increase in duration of postmenopausal years. Although bivariate analysis demon- strated that working women had a better menopause-specific quality of life than their non-working counterpart, multivariate linear regression model did not corroborate to this finding. Conclusion. Duration of postmenopausal years had a significant association with menopause-specific quality of life of women. Keywords: Menopause-specific quality of life, urban women, West Bengal Introduction Quality of life is understood as the individual’s perception of status in life according to the cultural and value system the person lives in, considering their aims, expectations, standards and worries. 1 This concept centres on various domains like, philosophical, psychological, social, politi- cal and health, and is considered for assessment of well- being at both individual and community level. Menopause is an inevitable reproductive phase during midlife when various physical and mental changes may impair the quality of life of women. 2–5 The quality of life during the menopause is a complex interaction of several different kinds of variable, 5 which is assessed not only by the frequency and severity of menopausal symptoms, life satisfaction and perceived health and mental status, 6,7 but also by the individual’s attitude towards loss of fertility, increase in duration of postmenopausal years, edu- cational, working and marital status and also parity. 2,8–11 Like other developing countries, Indian women posses a positive attitude towards menopause as they consider this phase as a relaxation from menstrual hassles. 12–16 Studies from India also reveal that impairment in quality of life of middle-aged women is associated with psychological and somatic problems rather than other menopause-specific health problems. 12,13,17,18 In the Indian context, studying quality of life after menopause is important because of an observed trend in the advancement of age at menopause, increase in both life-expectancy and subsequently the number of elderly women. 19–21 So far, few studies have been carried out on menopause-specific quality of life in India. The present study aims to find out the association of menopause- specific quality of life with respect to working status and duration of postmenopausal years. Methods Study area The present study was conducted in the city of Kolkata, the state capital of West Bengal, located on the eastern Menopause International 2012; 18: 99–105. DOI: 10.1258/mi.2012.011107 Menopause International Vol. 18 No. 3 September 2012 99