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Abortion and Ectopic Pregnancy
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Truth or Theory? An article published in the March issue (1998) of the American Journal of Public Health reports that large study conducted in France has found a 50 % increased risk of ectopic (tubal) pregnancy among women who have undergone abortion, and a 90 % increased risk among women who had more than one previous abortion.
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An ectopic pregnancy results when the embryo implants in the fallopian tube or elsewhere rather than the uterine wall. Undetected, the tube may rupture as the baby grows resulting in his death and presenting a serious threat to the mother's life. The authors indicate that despite progress in diagnosis and treatment, ectopic pregnancy is still the leading cause of maternal death in the first trimester of pregnancy.
They say there has been a three to four fold rise in the incidence of ectopic pregnancy in developed countries in the last twenty years, giving an incidence of 1.5 percent of all pregnancies. Several risk factors have been identified, including smoking at the time of conception, pelvic surgery, use of an IUD, pelvic inflammatory disease, and induced ovulation. Yet an earlier study showed these factors accounted for 65 percent of such pregnancies.
The present study, involving 1955 women, made adjustments for possible recall bias (the idea that women may under-report or over-report abortions) which is often raised as an objection when studies find a link between abortion and any pathology.
The authors speculate that the higher risk following abortion could be injuries, inflammations and infections resulting from the scraping and suctioning of the womb in a surgical abortion. Some previous American studies have shown a similar risk but most according to their authors, "have not revealed any significant association." The French researchers, however, dismiss such studies, saying they "generally have not included enough subjects to allow satisfactory statistical power. " Previous studies suggesting an increased risk include Chung, University of Hawaii 1981 (500 percent after abortion of first pregnancy); Panayotou, 1972 (l0-fold increase among women in Athens). (Source: Humanity, May 1998)
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