AN OBSERVATION ON MENSTRUAL MISBEHAVIORS

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Abstract
It was suspected that there might be some extraneous effect upon menstrual behavior as a result of the stress and strain of war yrs. In order to determine this, all age admissions of [female] [female] from the yrs. 1940 and 1945 were obtained from metropolitan hospitals in Dallas and the menstrual misbehavior noted among those [female] [female] whose ages ranged from 19 to 39. All possible pelvic pathology was discarded, including any questionable evidence of pregnancies. Menorrhagia, metrorrhagia, and dysmenorrhea were the 3 phenomena noted. In the year 1940 preceding the war, there was a total of 82 cases of menstrual misbehavior of the type mentioned between the ages of 19 and 39, and a total of all admissions of 9 9 of 9,141. In 1945, which represents the accumulated effect of the "war nerves," there was a total of 368 menstrual disorders among a population of all-age admissions of 12,398. These figures were tested for their significance. The difference in proportion of the 2 yrs. was taken and analyzed biometrically. The standard error of the difference was computed, which was found to be 0.0019. The difference in proportion divided by the standard error of the difference, which is considered a formal significance test, was 11 times the standard error of difference. Biometrically, any difference that is greater than twice the standard error is considered significant; that is, it is not considered to be the result of chance observation. This observation was made with the hope that some other observers might duplicate the studies in other hospitals. If the same result should be noted it would add materially to the concept of psychosomatic medicine or functional disturbances in general.

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