Maternal severe stressful life events and risk of abnormal vaginal bleeding among urban Chinese pregnant women

Abstract

Objective: The objective of this study is to assess whether maternal stressful life events are associated with increased risk of vaginal bleeding in urban China.

Methods: We implemented a cross-sectional study to examine the association between maternal severe stressful life events and vaginal bleeding in early pregnancy. Information was collected from an urban area and 956 participants were involved in final analysis. Multivariable logistic model was used to estimate the adjusted odds ratio (OR) and 95% confidence interval (95% CI) controlling for confounders.

Results: In total, 219 of the 956 participants were reported vaginal bleeding. Maternal stressful life events would increase the chance of vaginal bleeding with a crude OR of 2.14 (95% CI, 1.53–2.99). After adjustment for potential variables, the association remains significant (adjusted OR, 2.22; 95% CI, 1.56–3.16), and stratification analysis shows parity is an influence factor. The frequency of maternal stress and vaginal bleeding exist a dose–response relationship.

Conclusion: Maternal stressful life events are associated with the risk of vaginal bleeding in urban China. The parity status influences their association.

Keywords:

• Cross-sectional study
• first trimester
• psychological stresses
• urban pregnant women
• uterine hemorrhage

Acknowledgments

The authors are grateful to all medical staff in the Beijing Haidian Maternal and Child Health Hospital and volunteers in facilitating the performance of this study.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.