Reproductive outcomes in scoliosis patients

In a retrospective cohort study of 1,409 persons diagnosed with scoliosis between 1927 and 1965 in Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minnesota, mailed questionnaires were obtained for 846 white women. Six hundred and eight (72%) of these women had ever been pregnant, and they reported a total of 1,733 pregnancies and 1,413 livebirths. Adverse outcomes among the pregnancies and livebirths of the 608 women were reported, including spontaneous abortion, stillbirth, low birth weight, prematurity, congenital anomalies, and complications of pregnancy or delivery. Rates of these events for the scoliosis patients were compared with corresponding expected rates. Comparison of the overall rates suggested that the scoliosis patients had more premature births than expected, but their rates of other adverse reproductive events did not differ from expected.