Obstetric Outcomes of Mothers Previously Exposed to Sexual Violence.

• Published in: PLOS ONE
• Main Authors: Gisladottir, Agnes, Luque-Fernandez, Miguel Angel, Harlow, Bernard L, Gudmundsdottir, Berglind, Jonsdottir, Eyrun, Bjarnadottir, Ragnheidur I, Hauksdottir, Arna, Aspelund, Thor, Cnattingius, Sven, Valdimarsdottir, Unnur A
• Other Authors: 1 Univ Iceland, Ctr Publ Hlth Sci, Reykjavik, Iceland 2 London Sch Hyg & Trop Med, Dept Noncommunicable Dis Epidemiol, London WC1, England 3 Harvard Univ, Sch Publ Hlth, 665 Huntington Ave, Boston, MA 02115 USA 4 Boston Univ, Sch Publ Hlth, Boston, MA USA 5 Natl Univ Hosp Iceland, Landspitali, Rape Trauma Serv, Reykjavik, Iceland Organization-Enhanced Name(s) Landspitali National University Hospital 6 Natl Univ Hosp Iceland, Landspitali, Ctr Trauma, Reykjavik, Iceland Organization-Enhanced Name(s) Landspitali National University Hospital 7 Univ Iceland, Dept Psychol, Reykjavik, Iceland 8 Natl Univ Hosp Iceland, Landspitali, Dept Obstet & Gynecol, Reykjavik, Iceland Organization-Enhanced Name(s) Landspitali National University Hospital 9 Iceland Heart Assoc, Kopavogur, Iceland 10 Karolinska Inst, Clin Epidemiol Unit, Stockholm, Sweden 11 Karolinska Inst, Dept Med Epidemiol, Stockholm, Sweden
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: Public Library Science 2016
• Subjects: Meðganga; Kynbundið ofbeldi; PSC12; OAG12; Adolescent; Adult; Child; Female; Humans; Iceland; Pregnancy; Pregnancy Outcome; Sex Offenses; Young Adult
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/2336/618491; https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0150726

To access publisher's full text version of this article, please click on the hyperlink in Additional Links field or click on the hyperlink at the top of the page marked Files. This article is open access. There is a scarcity of data on the association of sexual violence and women's subsequent obstetric outcomes. Our aim was to investigate whether women exposed to sexual violence as teenagers (12-19 years of age) or adults present with different obstetric outcomes than women with no record of such violence. We linked detailed prospectively collected information on women attending a Rape Trauma Service (RTS) to the Icelandic Medical Birth Registry (IBR). Women who attended the RTS in 1993-2010 and delivered (on average 5.8 years later) at least one singleton infant in Iceland through 2012 formed our exposed cohort (n = 1068). For each exposed woman's delivery, nine deliveries by women with no RTS attendance were randomly selected from the IBR (n = 9126) matched on age, parity, and year and season of delivery. Information on smoking and Body mass index (BMI) was available for a sub-sample (n = 792 exposed and n = 1416 non-exposed women). Poisson regression models were used to estimate Relative Risks (RR) with 95% confidence intervals (CI). Compared with non-exposed women, exposed women presented with increased risks of maternal distress during labor and delivery (RR 1.68, 95% CI 1.01-2.79), prolonged first stage of labor (RR 1.40, 95% CI 1.03-1.88), antepartum bleeding (RR 1.95, 95% CI 1.22-3.07) and emergency instrumental delivery (RR 1.16, 95% CI 1.00-1.34). Slightly higher risks were seen for women assaulted as teenagers. Overall, we did not observe differences between the groups regarding the risk of elective cesarean section (RR 0.86, 95% CI 0.61-1.21), except for a reduced risk among those assaulted as teenagers (RR 0.56, 95% CI 0.34-0.93). Adjusting for maternal smoking and BMI in a sub-sample did not substantially affect point estimates. Our prospective data suggest that women with a history of ...