The influence of midtrimester termination of pregnancy on subsequent fertility: four to five years follow-up.

ABSTRACT

A four to five years follow-up upon subsequent fertility was performed on 46 women who underwent a midtrimester termination of pregnancy. Thirty out of 31 (96.8%) women who wanted to conceive became pregnant. Of those, term delivery rate was 73.3%. Only one woman who desired to conceive could not become pregnant. Her infertility workup revealed bilateral occlusion of tubes. We conclude that termination of pregnancy in midtrimester possibly has little, if any, impact upon subsequent fertility.

ABSTRACT

PIP In Israel, obstetrician-gynecologists examined the charts of 64 women who underwent midtrimester abortion at Kaplan Hospital in Rehovot between July 1988 and November 1989 to determine whether or not the abortion affected subsequent fertility 4-5 years after the operation. 14 of the women (21.9%) did not want to conceive. 96.8% of the women who wanted to conceive did so. 73.3% of these women delivered a full-term infant. One woman who wished to conceive could not because of bilateral occlusion of tubes. After her uterus had expelled the conceptus 4-5 years earlier, physicians performed curettage. She claimed to have had no history of pelvic inflammatory disease after the abortion. None of the women had subsequent cervical incompetence. These findings suggest that termination of midtrimester pregnancy had little or no effect on subsequent fertility. Further research is needed, however, with larger cohorts of women to confirm the association between midtrimester termination of pregnancy and subsequent fertility.