PMS - Diagnosis

Diagnosis

There is no laboratory test or unique physical findings to verify the diagnosis of PMS. The three key features are:

• The woman's chief complaint is one or more of the emotional symptoms associated with PMS (most typically irritability, tension, or unhappiness).
• Symptoms appear predictably during the luteal (premenstrual) phase, reduce or disappear predictably shortly before or during menstruation, and remain absent during the follicular (pre-ovulatory) phase of the menstrual cycle.
• The symptoms must be severe enough to disrupt or interfere with the woman's everyday life.

To establish a pattern, a woman's physician may ask her to keep a prospective record of her symptoms on a calendar for at least two menstrual cycles. This will help to establish if the symptoms are, indeed, limited to the premenstrual time and are predictably recurring. A number of standardized instruments have been developed to describe PMS, including the Calendar of Premenstrual syndrome Experiences (COPE), the Prospective Record of the Impact and Severity of Menstruation (PRISM), and the Visual Analogue Scales (VAS).

In addition, other conditions that may better explain symptoms must be excluded. A number of medical conditions are subject to exacerbation at menstruation, a process called menstrual magnification. These conditions may lead the patient to believe that she has PMS, when the underlying disorder may be some other problem, such as anemia, hypothyroidism, eating disorders and substance abuse. A key feature is that these conditions may also be present outside of the luteal phase. Conditions that can be magnified perimenstrually include depression or other affective disorders, migraine, seizure disorders, fatigue, irritable bowel syndrome, asthma, and allergies. Also, problems with other aspects of the female reproductive system must be excluded, including dysmenorrhea (pain during menses, rather than before it), endometriosis, perimenopause, and adverse effects produced by oral contraceptive pills.

Although there is no universal agreement about what qualifies as PMS, two definitions are commonly used in research programs:

• The National Institute of Mental Health research compares the intensity of symptoms from cycle days 5 to 10 to the six-day interval before the onset of menses. To qualify as PMS, symptom intensity must increase at least 30% in the six days before menstruation. Additionally, this pattern must be documented for at least two consecutive cycles.
• The definition formulated at the University of California at San Diego requires both affective (emotional) and somatic (physical) symptoms during the five days before menses in each of three consecutive cycles, and must not be present during the pre-ovulatory part of the cycle (days 4 through 13). For this definition, affective symptoms include symptoms like depression, angry outbursts, irritability, anxiety, confusion, and social withdrawal. Somatic symptoms include symptoms like breast tenderness, abdominal bloating, headache, and swelling of hands and feet.