Talk:Menopause/Archive 2

ARCHIVE PAGE 2: 2008-2010

Hot flashes?

The word is flushes. Presumably it's "flashes" in the USA, but WP:MOS requires that we stick to the form of English used by the first significant contributor to the article -that was User:Karen Johnson who is Australian, thus the article should use Commonwealth English not American English. Waggers (talk) 11:50, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

Possibly, but for self-consistency it should be noted that we have the article Hot flash. I myself tend to try to favor (or favour) the version that avoids using the[[this|that]] syntax for links simply for the sake of simplicity, and also, just to split hairs, when significantly rewriting an article the "first major contributor" provision doesn't necessary apply (I haven't however checked to see if the article has been significantly rewritten though). Triona (talk) 12:18, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

The article was extensively rewritten by me a while ago. I am British but have lived half my life in the USA. I used hot flash but also put hot flush in too as an alternative, I think it covers all bases. Invertzoo (talk) 16:19, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

Menopause in human evolution section

I removed this section:

"Another hypothesis is that menopause evolved not for a survival benefit, but in our Hunter gatherer past humans didn't live much past the age of 45 due to predation and other forms death not related to the persons genetics. Therefore there was not much selective pressure past the age of 45 for genes that made females reproductive past this point as they would never use those genes anyway. Now that humans live in an agricultural society and are much more protected from predation and the other elements of nature they live well into their old age exposing late occurring genetic mutations which accumulated in the human population do to very little selective pressure in later life against them, since most never made it past 45 anyway. Menopause being one of them along with other age related illnesses. Theoretically women may be evolving menopause to occur later and later in life, as now women do live an average of 75 yrs old, some will have children in their late 50's or even 60's giving an advantage to those genes that cause menopause to happen later in life, by baring more offspring on average than women that have menopause earlier in life."

Wikipedia is not the place for original research or speculations. If this theory is not original research, a respectable reference source must be quoted. I will also write to the new user who put in this paragraph. Invertzoo (talk) 18:26, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

For the same reasons, I removed this section

"Or it could work the other way around and the hypothalamus/pituitary is not sending the signals"

which seemed like an orphaned sentence, perhaps left from an earlier edit. Kitty Davis (talk) 20:21, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

I'm concerned that this section contains no references at all. Beyond the first two sentences which state reasonably clearly what the Grandmother hypothesis is, this section becomes a very speculative discussion which is of questionable value here. I would suggest the second sentence ought to read "According to this hypothesis, post reproductive women help feed and care for their own children, adult nursing daughters, and grandchildren and this has a greater benefit on the onward transmission of their genes than continuing to bear offspring themselves." I am fairly new to wikipedia and hesitate to hack this section about myself but I doubt the rest of the section should be here at all and suggest it should be changed. I'm especially struck by the unsupported statement about low contribution from hunting. If 'some evidence suggests', let's see it; I've heard of a study done in New Guinea which suggests this, but New Guinea is a very special environment with a particular lack of quarry animals which limits hunting potential. Traditional Eskimo by contrast lived almost totally by hunting. Erwfaethlon (talk) 10:25, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

I found it interesting that evolution is treated in this article as fact rather than theory. There are no citations noted in this section leaving one to wonder why evolution is even included in the article. I found the section to be out out character with the overall tone of the article. Maybe this is something that should be treated from from another angle altogether since the references to evolution in this case seems to be a bias. Chryslerfan (talk) 04:59, 30 September 2009 (UTC)

The scientific definition of the word "theory" is different from the colloquial sense of the word. Colloquially, "theory" can mean a conjecture, an opinion, or a speculation that does not have to be based on facts or make testable predictions. In science, the meaning of theory is more rigorous: a theory must be based on observed facts and make testable predictions. It is, therefore, better than fact. Indeed, evolution has been tested and accepted by the scientific community. I believe the article has now been updated and referenced with suitable peer reviewed articles - 213.123.176.56 (talk) 15:54, 8 February 2010 (UTC)

factual errors in article

see onset of menopause - ages stated are impossibly young for averages. I am not an expert in this area, so can not accurately correct the article. Please take a look, thanks! 3/22/08 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.98.105.188 (talk) 03:30, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

Nope, those are indeed accurate average ages. Do a Google search for "age of menopause" and you will see that all of that info is correct and universally recognized, for example look at the NIH information. Also, one other thing, please remember to sign your comments by typing 4 of these ~ Thanks. Invertzoo (talk) 12:34, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

I just wanted to add that a lot of people imagine that menopause is something that happens only to "old ladies". In fact it happens in mid life. Invertzoo(talk) 13:00, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

There's a bit of a misunderstanding, here. Someone changed all of the ages we had in the article from, say 51 to 31, 40 to 20, etc. So when the unsigned person above said "impossibly young for averages", he/she was I'm sure referring to the ages that were, indeed, impossibly young and likely changed by a vandal. I changed them back. So that's what the reference was to, Invertzoo.QuizzicalBee (talk) 16:44, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

Oh! Thanks very much QuizzicalBee. I don't come to this page every day and I don't have it watched, so I missed seeing that. I am glad you noticed it and changed it! Thanks, and I am sorry I misunderstood the message from 24.98.105.188. Invertzoo (talk) 17:24, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

Negative overall tone of article

This is my first comment on Wikipedia, so please forgive any proceedural/formatting errors.

While I dont like to open with a complaint, I am sorry to say that while this page has lots of useful information in it, a friend and I both consider the overall tone and presentation of it to be extremely negative and depressing to read.

Given that every woman will experience this event sooner or later and may come here seeking knowledge, more attention should be paid to reassuring personally interested readers that this is not the end of their world.

Terms like Faltering, Failing, shutting down, permanent cessation, stop working.. are used over and over again in the article making a woman feel like she is now broken and her usefulness in life is ended except to be someones grandmother. Because we all know that a womans only function in life is purely to be a baby making machine right ?

The list of problems that a woman might experience is also not clearly presented as a list of *possible* symtpoms, and the reader is not reassured that many will experience only *some* of them.

Also, the "here are some drugs available to fix the resulting problems" tone again reinforces the impression that this is something that needs to be "fixed" rather than understood and adapted to.

Consider that many women reading this article may be currently experiencing the mood swings, depression and other mental symptoms, and I am not surprised that one woman I know commented, that after reading this page, she felt like going and slitting her wrists.

I do not feel qualified to edit the main page overall structure or feel or write an introduction myself, but I seriously reccomend to whoever does that you give some compassionate understanding and consideration to the possible mind state of your potential readers and put care into at least an Introduction that reassures women that this is a natural event in every womans life and that there is still "life, pleasure and love after menopause".

Ideally I would like to see many sections slightly adjusted with a more upbeat tone to them - please remember the importance of "bedside manner" when giving medical advice

Spockie-Tech (talk) 12:19, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

I do understand what you are saying Spockie, but I just wanted to point out that Wikipedia is strictly an encyclopedia, not a self-help book. The article is not, and should not be, an essay or an opinion piece, or a magazine article on menopause. The article is primarily medical in tone and style, and that is perhaps quite appropriate for this topic on this encyclopedia. There is no intention whatsoever on Wikipedia to give medical advice, that would not be appropriate at all. Thanks for your input though, it is appreciated.Invertzoo (talk) 00:18, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

Today I have made some small but significant changes that may make the article a bit "softer" in its psychological impact on women reading it who are in the transition or about to to enter it. Invertzoo (talk) 22:28, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

I agree with Spockie. And the page, as it stands, still contains three pictures of the three "stages" of a woman's life. There is a bias toward biology here, as evidenced by the fact that the first "stage" is puberty. In fact, many women experience life as a series of stages that are in no way related to their sexuality. I find it disturbing that the young woman is smiling and all aglow, and the older woman is not. It is, in fact, very difficult to find photographs of older women that do not present them as "ugly", that show that they can smile and look healthy, too.

I realize this is supposed to be medical. But it is, in fact, ageist. What if Wikipedia ran an article on ethnicities and showed three different ethnic groups, with the light-skinned people all aglow and the dark-skinned people looking sick and unhappy?Westernscribenew (talk) 15:01, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

Hello Westernscribenew. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia. The menopause is a biological fact, and therefore of course the emphasis in the article is on the biology of menopause. If you feel there should be an article on the psychology of menopause or the sociology of menopause or a topic about older women that doesn't even mention menopause, then you are very welcome to go ahead and start one. This article is supposed to inform, not to inspire or comfort. If you didn't like the illustration you were welcome to change it. I for one thought the older woman looked wonderful, very happy and wise. And by the way, the article does not mention a woman's sexuality at all. Menopause is about a woman's reproductive potential, not her sexuality. Even nuns have to deal with menstruation and menopause. Invertzoo (talk) 14:48, 16 May 2010 (UTC)

Hormone Replacement Therapy Statement on the Menopause Treatment Section

I find the hormone replacement therapy statement in the menopause treatment section way too blurry and unprecise compared to the hormone replacement therapy entry, which is a much better summary of the clinical results found in the two comprehensive studies carried out by the WHI and by the Million Women Study Collaborators . HRT risk, according to these studies is clear cut, and therefore gynecologists have been advised by the NAMS to prescribe HRT only is very severe cases. I believe that common readers should be warned accurately about these findings.--Korazim (talk) 12:19, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

Removal of the Itanlian study on Melatonin in the Menopause treatment section

Taking into consideration the enormous amount of scientific information gathered on the various menopause treatment, I do not understand why does this relatively small study on the effect of melatonin on daily hormone levels get such a big stage in the "menopause treatment" section. I believe that other, much more significant and wide-scale studies dealing with commonly used treatments for menopause symptoms such as hormone replacement therapy should be put instead, and the melatonin study removed. I offer the WHI and million women studies as nomenes for the replacement. I also think that the sub-title is missing a lot of information about the various alternatives to HRT such as the various phytoestrogens. Any objections? --Korazim (talk) 14:20, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

I agree with you. Thanks. Invertzoo (talk) 00:34, 8 July 2008 (UTC)

Author of the word "menopause"?

I just now removed a phrase that claimed that the word "menopause" was "invented by Professor Michael Yevseev". No citation was given for this claim. In the complete edition of the Oxford English Dictionary, the first use of the word is in 1872, by an author called Peaslee in a book called Ovarian Tumors. Invertzoo (talk) 00:33, 8 July 2008 (UTC)

Reorganization of the Treatment -> Hormone Therapy section

To my opinion, a major change has to be done in the hormone therapy section under that "treatment" category. I think that this section is way too long, has numerous repetitions, and can be easily shortened to provide the reader with summarized, relevant information. For example, "other forms of hormone therapy" provides information about a variety of drugs that have no outstanding reason to me segmented from the normal :hormone therapy" category. Instead of this, we could add a hormone therapy drugs category, and list all the available HRT drugs on that list. I offer myself as the producer of this reorganization, as long as I get the proper acceptance of concept in this discussion page. I would appreciate if you would find the time to reply to this offer shortly. --Korazim (talk) 07:54, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

Hi Korazim, I do see your point, however, there are so many different HT drugs out there, even just in the USA, that this actually would make the article very much longer than it is now. Maybe what is needed is a separate article on that topic? Which country are you in by the way? I am thinking that it might be quite hard to give a global perspective on this because medications vary a lot from one country to another. best to you, Invertzoo (talk) 21:00, 15 August 2008 (UTC)

Changes in the intro section

Two days ago, the previous intro section was completely replaced with a new intro written by User:Inkbat who is a new Wikipedia editor. A lot of information was lost in the process, and also some "point of view" was introduced. I attempted to replace this new intro with a slightly reworked version of the old intro. I do however understand that there seems to be a desire among some readers that the menopause article be more inspiring and more positive-seeming for women reading it who are approaching or in the menopause transition. However that kind of self-help attitude is not the function of Wikipedia as I understand it. Glad to hear opinions on this. Invertzoo (talk) 19:15, 15 August 2008 (UTC)

I have gone a bit further in trying to make the intro less depressing. Hopefully this will satisfy some readers more than the earlier intro did. Invertzoo(talk) 13:04, 19 August 2008 (UTC)

Age of onset

I believe that a histogram of the age of onset should be added, but I don't have one. SomeStrangeMan (talk) 08:22, 14 September 2008 (UTC)

Yes, a histogram of the distribution of age of menopause within one large (national?) population would be really great to have, so if anyone finds one in a reliable source that they can work from to create a new version for Wikipedia, please do add it to the article. Invertzoo (talk) 21:19, 2 August 2010 (UTC)

"the Change"

Menopause should be consistently referred to as such, not using slang such as "the Change".

Additionally, I am not familiar with any literature that indicates similar "psychological and social challenges"in puberty and menopause. Hemac116 (talk) 04:36, 12 November 2008 (UTC)

Etymology

For some strange reason the etymology of menopause was given as meno = month. That's incorrect. It's derviation is from mensis. I've changed it. Mattopaedia (talk) 07:18, 14 February 2009 (UTC)

Umm, mensis is Latin and it literally means "of the month".[1]. Did you perhaps mean menses? If so that word is the plural form of the Latin word for month. Of course yes, it is a reference to the monthly periods, sometimes colloquially referred to as "monthlies".

Invertzoo (talk) 16:30, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

A topic of.....

Blatt Kupperman menopausal index is added based on the following info
http://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&lr=&newwindow=1&q=allintitle%3A+Blatt+Kupperman+index&btnG=Search

and

http://scholar.google.com/scholar?as_q=Kupperman+index&num=10&btnG=Search+Scholar&as_epq=&as_oq=&as_eq=&as_occt=title&as_sauthors=&as_publication=&as_ylo=&as_yhi=&as_allsubj=all&hl=en&lr=&newwindow=1 --124.78.209.238 (talk) 07:59, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

Changes in the intro

I see that at some point in the last 6 months or so the intro section was changed radically once again. As happened before, a lot of valuable information was lost in this change. Therefore I have restored as much of it as seemed appropriate. Menopause is not solely a process that happens in female humans, and I think this needs saying right up front.Invertzoo (talk) 16:56, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

It's also possible that we need to split the article into two. Perhaps we need a short article created that would be called "Menopause" and be about the general phenomenon from abiological perspective, and then this article would be "Menopause (human)" and only about humans. Or instead this one could be called "Menopause" and the other would be "Menopause (biology)" . Something like that. Invertzoo (talk) 17:29, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

Possible copypasting/plagiarizing (from Wikipedia)

It looks like the entire Menopause#Terminology, definitions, and commentary section was copypasted from an article written cited from a book by Maureen Aitken titledMastering Menopause - http://ezinearticles.com/?Mastering-Menopause&id=2618863 - although i'm not sure if it was written for Wikipedia first or not, as the site it's hosted on, ezinearticles.com evidently is registered on Wikipedia's spam blacklist. Not sure what's going on here but it would take some digging through the revision history and the spam blacklist history to find out; unfortunately I don't have time to do that right now so I'll just post this here. -- œ^™ 09:37, 12 November 2009 (UTC)

If it is the same pretty much verbatim, then it is certainly plagiarized from here. I wrote a lot of that section from scratch well over a year ago. Invertzoo(talk) 18:19, 17 December 2009 (UTC)

Note

—Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.167.61.214 (talk) 17:15, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Heading and message deleted as it was copied verbatim from a website, thus it was a copyright violation. Invertzoo (talk) 01:00, 3 August 2010 (UTC)