VULNERABILITY TO PERIMENSTRUAL MOOD CHANGE - THE RELEVANCE OF A PAST HISTORY OF DEPRESSIVE DISORDER

A past history of depressive illness, defined in terms of treatment by antidepressants, was found to be more common in women seeking help for premenstrual syndrome (PMS) (31.3%; N = 83) than in women complaining of menorrhagia (8.9%; N = 90) or controls (5.8%; N = 104) with dysmenorrhea sufferers (22%; N = 50) reporting intermediate rates. Such a history in the clinical groups was associated with a tendency for premenstrual depression to be relatively prolonged (i.e., persisting through the menstrual phase and sometimes into the postmenstrual week) and with more severe depressive symptoms during the premenstrual, menstrual, and to a lesser extent, postmenstrual phases of the cycle. This association was not evident for reported heaviness of menstrual bleeding and only weakly evident for severity of pain during the menstrual phase. Women with a depressive history gave higher neuroticism scores. A history of depression, as defined, seems to increase the vulnerability of women to depressive perimenstrual mood change in terms of both duration and severity. This effect on duration may hitherto have served to obscure the relationship between history of depression and premenstrual syndrome.