Knowledge and Perception Regarding Menopause among Married Women

Introduction: Menopause is one of the mile stones in women’s life that all women at midlife are expected to experience.

Objectives: To assess the knowledge and perception of married women regarding menopause, and to find out the association between the knowledge and perception of married women regarding menopause with selected demographic variables.

ethodology: A cross sectional descriptive study was conducted among 140 married women between the age group of 45-55 years. The study was conducted in two villages which were selected by simple random sampling from Udupi Taluk, Karnataka. Data were collected by using structured knowledge questionnaire and perception scale towards menopause. Data were analysed by using inferential and descriptive statistics. 

Results: Out of 140 married women the data shows that majority of women belongs to the age group of 45- 50 years and their mean age was 48.26 years and SD 2.359. Most 106(76.4%) of the women had a history of regular menstrual cycle and 138(98.6%) had no history of any gynaecological illness during the data collection. Majority of the married women 120(85.7%)had average knowledge on menopause. Among 140 married women most 111(79.3%) of them had good perception. There is significant association between knowledge score and education (χ² =25.680, p =0.008) and income (χ² =11.071, p = 0.027).There is weak positive correlation between the knowledge and perception was observed (r = 0.212, p = 0.010).

Conclusion: Awareness regarding menopause is very essential and should not be neglected. Assessing the knowledge and perception regarding menopause will help them to cope up with the changes that take place during this stage.