Pregnant women who develop gestational diabetes or pre-eclampsia have increased mortality risks for many years after giving birth.
- In this recent study, the five adverse pregnancy outcomes were premature birth, gestational diabetes, pre-eclampsia, low birth weight and other hypertensive disorders.
- Women who experienced these serious complications had an increased risk of mortality which remained high more than 40 years later.
- These patients need early preventive evaluation and long-term follow-up for the detection and treatment of chronic disorders associated with premature death.
What are the long-term risks of death among women whose pregnancy took place under unfavorable conditions? This is the question asked by researchers from the universities of Texas Health Science Center (United States) and Lund (Sweden). To answer this question, they consulted the medical records of 2,195,667 Swedish women who gave birth between 1973 and 2015. All the information on the duration of their pregnancy, the weight of the infant at birth, their health as they were getting older were included in the study published in the journal JAMA Internal Medicine.
Gestational diabetes, pre-eclampsia: a higher death rate up to 40 years after childbirth
The team compared the perspectives of women who had serious complications during pregnancy and the birth of their child with those of patients who had not given birth or who had given birth but did not have serious problems. When scientists talked about serious complications, they talked about premature birth, gestational diabetes, pre-eclampsia, low birth weight and other hypertensive disorders.
During the 56-year follow-up, 88,055 women died. The results showed that patients who experienced one of the five main adverse pregnancy outcomes had increased mortality risks that remained elevated more than 40 years after delivery. In detail, volunteers with gestational diabetes saw their mortality rate increase by 53%, and those who gave birth prematurely by 41%. The authors also found that women who gave birth to a baby smaller than average had a 30% higher rate of death. Those affected by blood disorders unrelated to pre-eclampsia and those with pre-eclampsia were 27% and 13% more likely to die prematurely.
Consider pregnancy complications when assessing women’s health
After accounting for other factors that might influence rates, such as environment and genetics, and then including siblings in their work, the researchers observed that these results could not be explained by common family factors. “Physicians should consider pregnancy complications when evaluating the health status of their patients. Further research is needed to determine why these women are at increased risk of death,” concluded the team.