[Onset of menarche in Skopje. (Comparative studies on 22,727 women up to the 6th decade of age)].

Studies of menarche in Skopje have shown that its secular trend is significantly more pronounced in younger than in older generations. While in the young it amounts to 2.5--3 months per decade, in the elderly it is up to one month per decade. The total acceleration in the course of this century has proved to be 13.5 months. The earliest menarche was recorded in Romanies (13.46 +/- 0.92), the latest in Albanians (14.05 +/- 1.22), while Macedonian girls are somewhere in--between, along with other nationalities (14.0 +/- 1.40). Menarche proved to appear earlier in girls from very well-to-do families (13.95 +/- 1.36) than in those from families with a very low income (14.19 +/- 1.43). The latest beginning of the menstruation has been recorded in girls from peasant families (14.38 +/- 1.17). Sporadic repeated investigations of this king in different parts of the country, by using a more modern "status quo" method, appear necessary in order to determine differences in the menarcheal age in the country as a whole and to shed more ligh on their underlying causes.