[Effect of abortion on subsequent fertility with special reference to the abortion process]

Abstract

The influence of a first gravida's legal abortion to the later reproduction was researched on 406 patients in the age between 13 up to 18 years--

Result: The rate of abortion and premature birth is significantly increased at subsequent pregnancies when there took place an interruption of the first gravidity.--About 70% of the coming gravidities following an interruption of the first gravidity deliver in the time between 37. up to 39. week of pregnancy.--Premature births having a birth weight below 2500 g are found in 10,17% of the cases compared with a control group showing 5,45%.

PIP: A significant increase in the incidence of spontaneous abortion or premature birth after a preceeding induced abortion (p less than .01) was observed in a material of 5200 induced abortion patients at the Regional Hospital at Zwickau between 1970 and 1975. A follow-up study of 360 13-18 year old women from this material was undertaken in 1977 to determine the effect of induced abortion on later pregnancies. 62.78% of the women were married, of these 64.16% had had children. There was a 10.78% premature birth rate and 10.17% spontaneous abortion rate. 5.75% had undergone an induced abortion 1 or 2 additional times. 4.42% of the married women used oral contraceptives regularly. Sterility was found in 5.30% of the married women; there were 2 cases of ectopic pregnancy. Of the 134 single women, 78.36% used oral contraceptives regularly, 7 had undergone a subsequent abortion. A 10.17% (n=23) spontaneous abortion rate was recorded among 226 women who wanted children, in 41.86% of the cases in the 1st trimester, in 58.44% in the 2nd. In 18 of these cases the preceeding induced abortion had been performed by dilatation according to Hegar followed by vacuum aspiration. In both the premature and full-term births observed after a previous abortion, a decrease in the average birth weight was found. In ca 70% of the pregnancies which directly follow an induced abortion, the birth occurs in the 37th-39th week of pregnancy. This is especially important in view of the naturally significantly higher premature birth rate among young women.