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Menopause status [message #3799]

Fri, 13 February 2015 18:57

AConklin
Messages: 9
Registered: November 2014
Location: Los Angeles

Member

Hello,

I am trying to ascertain women's menopause status to generate a new variable to include in a multilevel model. I wanted to create a binary variable using v226 (months since last period), but some filter checks with other demographic variables raise some questions about v226...

For example, a tabulation of women coded 994 ("in menopause") shows ages from 15 to 49 which seems biologically implausible. Also, a tabulation of v226 by currently pregnant shows that 45 women are "in menopause" and "currently pregnant". Similarly among those who "never menstruated" (i.e 996), a cross tab with currently pregnant shows 57 were in the "1" category (and ages ranged from 13 to 49).

The DHS guide to statistics and recode manual indicate that the base for menopause is women aged 30-49 years, and that menopause status is determined by women who had their last period over 6 months prior to the survey, had a hysterectomy, self-reported or never mentstruated.

Should I be using a different variable/question in addition/instead to determine menopause status?

Note: my dataset is an amalgamation of 63 countries between 1999-2014 containing nearly 1.7m obs total.

Many thanks in advance for your help/clarification,
A Conklin

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Re: Menopause status [message #3804 is a reply to message #3799]

Sat, 14 February 2015 17:19

Trevor-DHS
Messages: 805
Registered: January 2013

Senior Member

There are two sources of information that can be used about menopause:
1) Women's direct reporting that they are in menopause in v226.
2) Information about time since last period also recorded in v226.
The reference to the guide to statistics that you mention relates to the calculation of an indicator reported in DHS reports related to menopause and how that indicator is calculated. It does not relate to the way the data are collected, and the data are available for a broader group of women than those aged 30-49 that are used in the indicator.

The inconsistencies you note are not unusual. Respondents in the survey do not always provide consistent responses. While we check data for consistency quite extensively it is not possible to correct all cases and inconsistencies remain in the data. I'm actually surprised that you only find around 50 in a file of 17.M cases.

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Re: Menopause status [message #3816 is a reply to message #3804]

Tue, 17 February 2015 19:16

AConklin
Messages: 9
Registered: November 2014
Location: Los Angeles

Member

Dear Trevor,

Thank you for your reply and for clarifying the information about age range I found in the Guide.
I wonder if you might have some advice, or know of a protocol, on how to deal with the few inconsistencies that still remain despite extensive DHS efforts to code these. Should I drop, or recode into a separate category, those women who self-report as 'in menopause' but also report they are pregnant?

Many thanks again,
Annalijn

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Re: Menopause status [message #3820 is a reply to message #3816]

Tue, 17 February 2015 22:07

Trevor-DHS
Messages: 805
Registered: January 2013

Senior Member

My inclination would be to treat these women as pregnant and not as menopausal. I think it is more likely that the reporting of their pregnancy is accurate, and that possibly the reporting related to their last period was inaccurate.

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