Research
Hormonal
Surgical menopause (bilateral oophorectomy) before age 50 is associated with increased epigenetic age acceleration in both blood and saliva.
If you undergo surgical removal of your ovaries before age 50, this study suggests it may accelerate biological aging in your blood and saliva. This highlights the importance of discussing long-term health strategies, such as hormone therapy, with your doctor to manage these potential effects.
GoodSupportsMEDIUM confidence
Conversely, epigenetic age acceleration in buccal epithelium and saliva do not relate to age at menopause; however, a higher epigenetic age in saliva is exhibited in women who undergo bilateral oophorectomy (P = 0.0079)... bilateral oophorectomy is associated with an increased epigenetic age of blood and saliva.
Why this rating
Significant P-values in multiple cohorts for blood and saliva, but observational nature limits causal inference.
Source
Menopause accelerates biological aging
Morgan E. Levine et al. · Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences · 2016
DOI 10.1073/pnas.1604558113
cohort · n=2810Cited 500×
Read the paper DOI resolved against Crossref · corpus check 2026-06-10
More from this paper
- Menopause, particularly when occurring early or via surgical removal of ovaries, accelerates biological aging as measured by epigenetic age acceleration in blood.Good
- Menopausal Hormone Therapy (MHT) is associated with lower epigenetic age acceleration in buccal epithelium, suggesting a potential protective effect against epigenetic aging in this tissue.Good
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