The Impact of Menopause on Immune Senescence

Several lines of evidence suggest that ovarian steroids modulate immune function in women. Women are at higher risk of autoimmune disease than men; generate more robust humoral responses to vaccination than men; and plasma cytokine levels and the immune response to certain vaccines change throughout the menstrual cycle. Aging is accompanied by a decline in immunity referred to as "immune senescence" that significantly contributes to increased morbidity and mortality in the elderly. Aging is also associated with menopause, one of the most dramatic age-related physiological changes in women. Given the strong evidence for sex differences in immune function between pre-menopausal adult women and men, it has been suggested that the loss of ovarian steroids associated with menopause might contribute to decreased immune function in post-menopausal women. However, we do not yet fully understand the interplay between ovarian and immune senescence. In this article, we review studies that have investigated the impact of menopause and hormone therapy on changes in immune function.