Describing Adverse Pregnancy Events and Pregnancy-Associated Death Among Veterans.

Quinn DA, Sileanu FE, Mor MK, Callegari LS, Borrero S. Describing Adverse Pregnancy Events and Pregnancy-Associated Death Among Veterans. Journal of women's health (2002). 2024 Sep 20.

Related HSR&D Project(s)

• CDA 20-224 – Examining Pre-Pregnancy Health and Maternal Outcomes among Women Veterans

Dimensions for VA is a web-based tool available to VA staff that enables detailed searches of published research and research projects.

If you have VA-Intranet access, click here for more information vaww.hsrd.research.va.gov/dimensions/

VA staff not currently on the VA network can access Dimensions by registering for an account using their VA email address.    Search Dimensions for VA for this citation
* Don't have VA-internal network access or a VA email address? Try searching the free-to-the-public version of Dimensions

Search for Abstract from PubMed

---

Abstract:

Veterans who use VA pregnancy benefits may be at high risk for adverse pregnancy outcomes; however, little is known about rates of adverse pregnancy events or pregnancy-associated death among Veterans. We conducted a retrospective cohort study using VA national administrative data for Veterans ages 18-45 with at least one pregnancy outcome between October 2009 and September 2016 and a VA primary care visit within one year prior to pregnancy. We identified adverse events during pregnancy and up to 42 days after pregnancy and all-cause mortality within one year of pregnancy and compared prevalence of adverse events by Veteran race/ethnicity using adjusted logistic regression. Pregnancies among Black Veterans had 69% higher odds of any adverse event than those among White Veterans (aOR = 1.69, 95% CI: 1.43, 2.00). All-cause mortality during pregnancy or within one year of pregnancy was recorded for 18 pregnancies, resulting in an estimated overall pregnancy-associated mortality rate of 76 deaths per 100,000 live births. We identified high overall rates of adverse pregnancy events and pregnancy-associated death among Veterans using VA benefits. As in non-VA populations, there were stark racial disparities in adverse pregnancy events among Veterans.