Is osteoporosis in postmenopausal female patients related to previous pregnancies and/or miscarriages?

Abstract

Objective To investigate if osteopenia and osteoporosis in postmenopausal female patients are related to previous pregnancies and/or miscarriages.

Patients and methods We studied 81 postmenopausal female patients, 40 with osteopenia or osteoporosis and 41 without osteopenia or osteoporosis, carefully matched for age (control group). In the two groups, the presence or not of osteopenia, osteoporosis, or both, were analyzed and compared with the number of childbirths and/or miscarriages.

Results Overall, no statistical difference was found among the 40 patients with one, two, three or more than three childbirths and osteopenia or osteoporosis compared with the control group (p = 0.5363, p = 0.5782, p = 0.0763, p = 0.1931, respectively). Similarly, no differences were found between the osteopenia/osteoporosis group and the control group in relation to previous one, two, three or more than three miscarriages. When both childbirths and miscarriages were added together (three, four, five, six, more than six), again no statistical difference was found between the osteopenia/osteoporosis group and the control group.

Conclusions In postmenopausal women, the obstetric history of previous childbirths and/or miscarriages, independent of the number, did not seem to be a risk factor for osteopenia or osteoporosis.

Key words:

• Dxa
• Bone mineral density
• Osteopenia
• Osteoporosis
• Childbirth
• Miscarriages
• Menopause