Introduction: Dysmenorrhea is pain associated with menstruation. It’s often an issue discussed in privacy yet continues to affect girls and women with grave impact on their education, social activities and work. General objective: To assess the factors that influence the prevalence of dysmenorrhea among students aged 18-45 years in institutions of higher learning in Kampala Capital city from July- August 2015. Methodology: A cross sectional study was employed to collect data on prevalence of dysmenorrhea and associated factors among 351 students of higher learning in Kampala who were selected using convenience sampling method. A self-administered questionnaire was utilized to collect this data with the help of trained research assistants. Data was analyzed using the following software: Epiinfo version 7 and SPSS version 20 for analysis. Results: The prevalence of dysmenorrhea was 75.8% and associated factors were found to be: having children (p<0.05) and daily consumption of chocolate (OR=0.09, p=0.011) or no sugary foods at all (OR=0.344, p=0.032) and no family history of dysmenorrhea (OR=2.583, p=0.001). Conclusion: The prevalence of dysmenorrhea was high which was influenced mainly by the number of children, no family history of dysmenorrhea and daily consumption of sugary foods. Recommendations: The high prevalence of dysmenorrhea among students requires health education about it, its causes, management, schools to stock analgesics in the school clinics and further research on its effect on academic life of the students.

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