Long, irregular menstrual cycles up risk of NAFLD

Young, premenopausal women with long or irregular menstrual cycles are at an increased risk of both prevalent and incident nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD), reveals a study.

“Women with long or irregular menstrual cycles may benefit from lifestyle modification advice to reduce the risk of NAFLD and associated cardiometabolic diseases,” the investigators said.

A total of 72,092 women aged <40 years who underwent routine health examinations were included in this cross-sectional study; a subset of 51,118 women without NAFLD at baseline were included in the longitudinal analysis. Long or irregular cycles referred to menstrual cycles of 40 days or longer or too irregular to estimate. NAFLD was identified by performing abdominal ultrasonography.

The investigators conducted multivariable Cox proportional hazard regression analyses to estimate hazard ratios (HRs) and 95 percent confidence intervals (CIs) for incident NAFLD according to menstrual cycle regularity and length, with 26- to 30-day cycles as the reference.

Of the participants, 27.7 percent had long or irregular menstrual cycles and 7.1 percent had prevalent NAFLD at baseline. Long or irregular menstrual cycles positively correlated with prevalent NAFLD. Incident NAFLD occurred in 8.9 percent of women during a median follow-up of 4.4 years.

After adjusting for age, body mass index, insulin resistance, and other confounders, the multivariable-adjusted HR for NAFLD was 1.22 (95 percent CI, 1.14‒1.31) when comparing long or irregular menstrual cycles to the reference group. This association further increased in time-dependent analysis (HR, 1.49, 95 percent CI, 1.38‒1.60).