Gestational Hypertension, Preeclampsia, and Eclampsia and Future Neurological Disorders

Gestational hypertension, preeclampsia, and eclampsia are established risk factors for stroke and dementia later in life. Whether these pregnancy complications are associated with an increased risk of new-onset neurological disorders within months to years after giving birth is not known.

To explore whether gestational hypertension, preeclampsia, and eclampsia are associated with new-onset migraine, headache, epilepsy, sleep disorder, or mental fatigue within months to years after giving birth.

In this register-based cohort study, exposures were identified in the Swedish Medical Birth Register from 2005 to 2018. Follow-up was conducted using the National Patient Register, containing diagnoses from specialized inpatient and outpatient care. Follow-up started 42 days after delivery and continued until the first event, death, emigration, or the end of the follow-up period (2019). The risk was calculated with Cox regression analysis and expressed as adjusted hazard ratio (aHR) with a 95% CI. Through the Swedish Medical Birth Register, 659 188 primiparous women with singleton pregnancies between 2005 and 2018 were identified. Women with a diagnosis of chronic hypertension (n = 4271) or a prepregnancy neurological disorder (n = 6532) were excluded. The final study population included 648 385 women. Data analyses were conducted in 2023.

Gestational hypertension, preeclampsia, and eclampsia.

The primary outcome was a composite neurological outcome of migraine, headache, epilepsy, sleep disorder, or mental fatigue.

The study included 648 385 women with a mean age of 28.5 (SD, 5.0) years at the time of their first pregnancy. Women with gestational hypertension (n = 11 133), preeclampsia (n = 26 797), and eclampsia (n = 625) all had an association with increased risk for a new-onset neurological disorder compared with women with normotensive pregnancies. The aHR for gestational hypertension was 1.27 (95% CI, 1.12-1.45), 1.32 (95% CI, 1.22-1.42) for preeclampsia, and 1.70 (95% CI, 1.16-2.50) for eclampsia. When exploring individual outcomes, women with eclampsia were associated with more than a 5 times increased risk of epilepsy (aHR, 5.31; 95% CI, 2.85-9.89).

In this study, gestational hypertension, preeclampsia, and eclampsia were associated with an increased risk of new-onset migraine, headache, epilepsy, sleep disorder, or mental fatigue within months to years after giving birth. Guidelines recommend follow-up after delivery for women with gestational hypertension and preeclampsia for their increased risk of cardiovascular disease. At these visits, caregivers should also pay attention to persisting or new-onset of neurological symptoms, since this group of women appears to be vulnerable to developing or experiencing neurological disorders.