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Women who want to know how much time they have left on their biological clock should consult their mothers as Dutch doctors believe that the age at which menopause occurs is largely dictated by genes.

Scientists at the Diakonessen Hospital in Utrecht and Wageningen University, who carried out a study of the genetic factors involved in menopause, said that menopause was 85 percent determined by genes. Hence a woman is likely to follow the same pattern as her mother or sisters.

The research team studied data on 243 sisters from 118 families who took part in a breast cancer screening project that began in the 1970s, as well as information from 22 non-identical and 37 identical sets of twins. Their research is reported in the journal Human Reproduction.

De Bruin and his team found that the age at which non-twin sisters reached menopause was 85 to 87 percent due to genetic factors. In twin sisters, genetics accounted for up to 71 percent.

A woman with one or more first-degree relatives with a history of early menopause is liable to experience earlier menopause herself, according to the researchers. This same woman is also expected to start becoming less fertile and to be completely infertile at an earlier age.

But experts added that even if a woman has a family history of late menopause, it might not be safe to postpone starting a family. Women are generally thought to be most fertile between the ages of 20 and 25. Fertility begins to decline after 30.

Other factors such as smoking, having children, and using birth control pills may also influence the age at the onset of menopause, which is caused by the depletion of a woman's eggs.

The scientists are now trying to isolate the genes that control menopause. In the future, De Bruin said women may be able to take a DNA test that could predict the age at which they could expect menopause to begin.

A better understanding of the genetic factors influencing the decline of female fertility could also lead to the development of treatments that may slow down the process, according to Human Reproduction 2001 (16:2014-2018).

Information provided is courtesy of and compiled by the Academy of Anti-Aging Research.