COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF PHYSICAL ACTIVITY, CLIMACTERIC SYMPTOMS, AND OPTIMISM IN EARLY VS LATE POSTMENOPAUSAL WOMEN

Purpose: Numerous studies highlight the importance of maintaining a healthy lifestyle and being physically active to improve quality of life and reduce the risk of developing chronic non-communicable dis eases. These precautions are particularly crucial for menopausal women, as the reduction in estrogen levels can lead to increased body fat, stress, and depression. These changes often result in feelings of inadequacy and a reduced desire to exercise and care for oneself. This cross-sectional study aims to evaluate the differences in physical activity (PA), body composition, climacteric symptoms, and optimism between women in early and late postmenopause. Methods: The sample included 20 women, divided into early post menopause (EP; n = 10) and late postmenopause (LP; n = 10)1. All women wore the accelerometers Actigraph GT3X ? 4 consecutive days to monitor their levels of PA (sedentary, light PA, moderate vigorous PA and steps/day). The cut-off points proposed by Kamada et al. 2 were considered and physical activity was classified according to WHO 3 guidelines. Body mass index was calculated, and the presence of obesity was considered for values C 35% 4. Climacteric symptoms were evaluated using the Greene Climacteric Scale 5, and the Revised Life Orientation Test 6 was used to assess optimism. Data were summarized using descriptive statistics, and analysis was con ducted using either the Student’s t-test or the Mann–Whitney test. Significance was accepted as p B 0.05. Results: The majority of the sample had a natural menopause (95%) and didnt report using hormone therapy (85%). Differences in age (p = 0.01) were identified between the two groups under analysis (55.80 ± 4.84 years in EP and 62.32 ± 5.28 years in LP), and obe sity was identified in 9 participants. Most of the sample was physically active (90%), but 75% of them took fewer than 10,000 steps per day. The average Greene Climac teric Scale score was 0.96 points (± 0.57), with significant differences (p = 0.05) observed only between the two groups in relation to vasomotor symptoms. Women in LP presented less sedentary behaviour (3833.30 min/week in LP and 4125.00 min/week in EP; p = 0.05) and a higher number of daily steps (9769.30 and 7733.00, respectively). Conclusions: The findings suggest that women who have been menopausal for more than 6 years experience higher levels of vaso motor symptoms compared to those in early perimenopause (EP). Conversely, these women exhibit less sedentary behavior and take more steps per day.