Australian scientists are on the search for why some women suffer severe and often debilitating period pain and others don't.
Dysmenorrhoea, or painful menstrual cramps, affects one in five teenage girls and one in 10 women of reproductive age.
Pain specialist and gynaecologist Dr Susan Evans says chronic period pain is a "hidden epidemic" that needs to be explored.
"The suffering not only affects them, but their families and society generally, '' Dr Evans said.
''From a health services perspective, pelvic pain is a hidden epidemic in our community - common, but not spoken about, or provided for'' she said.
While a condition known as endometriosis can be responsible for severe pain during menstruation, it doesn't explain all pain, said Dr Evans.
"We have so much more to learn through research," Dr Evans said.
Researchers at the University of Adelaide suggests that the causes may be the activation of the immune system by the female hormone oestrogen.
A current study investigated the immune system sensitivity of 56 women, and related this to the severity of their pain, using a blood test developed by Dr Heillie Kwok,
Early findings strongly suggest that women with severe pain have increased inflammation and activation of pain pathways.
Dr Evans says the research has enormous potential.
''Finding new reasons why some women have more pain, may lead us to new and more effective medications for both severe period pain and other pain conditions where inflammation is present,'' she said.
''Further development of the blood test used in this study may provide us with a way to measure severe pain, quickly and easily. Improved ways to measure an oversensitive immune reaction to pain is a cutting edge focus of pain research.''
Dr Evans will present the lab findings at the annual scientific meeting of Australian and New Zealand College of Anaesthetists in Brisbane on Saturday.
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