Key Takeaways:
- Heart palpitations describe when your heart flutters, races, or skips. They’re a common symptom of perimenopause.
- Heart palpitations during perimenopause typically happen due to decreases in the hormone estrogen. This shift can affect how your heart beats, increasing the likelihood of palpitations.
- You may experience palpitations during hot flashes or night sweats. Other factors — such as poor sleep, high stress, or other existing medical conditions — can also cause heart palpitations.
- You can typically manage perimenopause heart palpitations with lifestyle changes. If they happen along with frequent hot flashes and night sweats, your doctor may discuss hormone replacement therapy (HRT) with you as a treatment option.
Have you ever felt like your heart skipped a beat? (And not because you just locked eyes with an attractive strange.) That sensation of your heart fluttering, racing, or pounding is commonly known as heart palpitations.
There are several reasons to explain why you may experience heart palpitations, one of which is where you are in your life cycle. So, if you’ve ever wondered, Can menopause cause heart palpitations? Know that the answer is yes, it’s certainly possible.
Below, learn more about the potential links between perimenopause and heart palpitations. Plus, get details on the treatments and lifestyle changes you can implement to help manage the episodes.
What Are Perimenopause Heart Palpitations?
When you’re having heart palpitations, your heartbeat typically becomes more noticeable, and it may feel abnormal or even uncomfortable. You may feel like your heart is:
- Fluttering
- Pounding
- Racing
- Skipping a beat
- Flip-flopping in your chest
Heart palpitations are a pretty common, if less-discussed, symptom of perimenopause. Also called the transition into menopause, perimenopause is the time period leading up to your final menstrual period. After you don’t have a menstrual cycle for a year, it’s typically understood that you are in menopause.
Research supports the existence of a link: One 2021 systematic review estimated that 20 to 40 percent of women going through perimenopause may experience heart palpitations. And a 2025 study that investigated common symptoms of perimenopause identified heart palpitations as one of eight symptoms significantly associated with the transition.
The Link Between Perimenopause and Heart Palpitations
The heart-racing feeling you may experience during perimenopause may be thanks to hormonal changes, specifically your estrogen levels. During perimenopause, your ovaries begin to produce less estrogen, and this can have a variety of effects on your body.
Estrogen interacts with your autonomic nervous system, which controls functioning like heart rate, blood pressure, and breathing. Low estrogen levels associated with menopause can, in turn, negatively impact the function of your autonomic nervous system. For another layer connecting perimenopause to heart palpitations, research suggests that estrogen can have a stabilizing effect on your heart rate.
Essentially, falling estrogen levels during perimenopause may affect your heartbeat regularity, which may boost the likelihood of experiencing a racing, pounding, or fluttering heart.
What Else Can Cause Heart Palpitations?
Perimenopause heart palpitations are often linked with vasomotor symptoms, which include hot flashes and night sweats. Vasomotor symptoms affect up to an estimated 75 percent of women in perimenopause, and are also typically the result of hormone changes.
In fact, your heart rate can increase by 8 to 16 beats per minute during a hot flash. Some research suggests that heart palpitations are more likely in women who have severe vasomotor symptoms.
In addition to hormonal changes, there are also other risk factors or causes of heart palpitations during perimenopause. These include:
- Poor sleep
- Stress or anxiety
- Intense or strenuous physical activity
- Caffeine or alcohol consumption
- Smoking
- Certain over-the-counter or prescription medications
- Cardiovascular disease, including arrhythmias, heart failure, and coronary heart disease
- Other medical conditions, like thyroid disease and anemia
Additionally, a 2022 study also linked lower levels of physical activity and poorer overall quality of life with a higher risk of palpitations during perimenopause.
There is some notable overlap between the aforementioned conditions and symptoms of perimenopause. For example, poor sleep, stress, and anxiety are all associated with both perimenopause and palpitations. So, experiencing any of these in addition to hormonal changes may further boost your risk of heart palpitations.
How Are Heart Palpitations Treated During Perimenopause?
Typically, you can manage low estrogen heart palpitations (aka the kind you experience during perimenopause and menopause) by making a few lifestyle changes. Many of the shifts are also positive strategies to boost your overall wellness and heart health. They include:
- Reducing your stress levels
- Getting enough sleep at night
- Limiting alcohol and caffeine intake
- Quitting smoking
- Getting regular exercise
If heart palpitations occur with other menopause-related symptoms, like hot flashes and night sweats, your healthcare provider may recommend hormone replacement therapy (HRT). HRT supplements your body’s lack of or entirely missing estrogen (and sometimes progesterone as well).
According to research, systemic estrogen therapy alone or with progesterone may reduce the frequency of vasomotor symptoms by around 75 percent. There’s also some evidence that suggests using HRT to treat menopause symptoms may also directly reduce heart palpitations. Your healthcare provider can help you determine if HRT might be an appropriate intervention for you.
And if a medical condition is causing your heart palpitations, your healthcare provider will recommend some treatment options to manage it. Depending on the condition, this can involve additional medications and lifestyle changes.
Are Perimenopause Heart Palpitations Serious?
Most of the time, heart palpitations are harmless and last for between a few seconds and a few minutes. However, frequent palpitations can also be a sign of an arrhythmia, a type of abnormal heart rhythm that can be medically severe, or another potentially serious heart problem.
Due to hormonal shifts, women in perimenopause are also at a higher risk of heart disease in general. So, taking care of your heart and blood vessels is an important component of women’s health during this transitional period.
If you’re having frequent heart palpitations, it’s important to seek medical advice from a healthcare provider who can help you determine the cause and treatment. For example, they can order tests to determine if your palpitations are the result of an underlying heart issue and, if so, can refer you to a cardiology specialist.
The Bottom Line
Heart palpitations are pretty common during perimenopause. They can happen due to hormonal fluctuations, specifically estrogen. The hormonal shifts can impact the way your heart beats.
Palpitations during perimenopause often happen alongside related vasomotor symptoms, like hot flashes and night sweats. Other causes of heart palpitations may include poor sleep, high stress levels, and certain medical conditions.
You can typically manage perimenopause palpitations by implementing lifestyle changes and, when recommended, HRT. If you’re having frequent palpitations, it’s important to visit your healthcare provider for an evaluation to make sure they’re not connected to an underlying heart condition.
FAQ
Are heart palpitations common in perimenopause?
Yes. Some research suggests that up to 40 percent of women in perimenopause experience palpitations.
What do heart palpitations feel like?
Heart palpitations are often described as feeling like your heart is racing, pounding, fluttering, or skipping a beat. This sensation typically lasts for a few seconds or minutes.
Why do heart palpitations happen during perimenopause?
Falling estrogen levels during perimenopause are the main cause of perimenopausal heart palpitations.
What else can cause heart palpitations?
Factors like poor sleep, increased stress, caffeine and alcohol intake, and some medical conditions can also cause heart palpitations.
When should I see a doctor for heart palpitations during perimenopause?
If you’re having frequent heart palpitations, it’s important to see your healthcare provider to make sure they’re not due to an underlying medical condition. If heart palpitations last several minutes and happen with symptoms like chest pain, shortness of breath, or lightheadedness, seek emergency medical care.
Are there effective treatments for heart palpitations during perimenopause?
It’s typically possible to manage heart palpitations due to perimenopause using lifestyle changes and sometimes HRT.
What can I do at home to help reduce heart palpitations?
You can help to reduce the frequency of heart palpitations by lowering stress, getting enough sleep at night, limiting caffeine and alcohol intake, and quitting smoking.
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This article originally appeared on ForHers.com and was syndicated by MediaFeed.org.
