Unintended pregnancies and family planning among women after kidney or liver transplantation

Abstract

Background: To evaluate the incidence of unplanned pregnancies in female organ transplant recipients.

Methods: In a single-center cross-sectional study 252 women aged 18–45 years who underwent kidney or liver transplantation were asked to fill in a survey form.

Results: 217 (86%) women were enrolled in the study. Fifty-three percent of women declared 181 pregnancies, of which 30% (54/181) were unplanned. Women more frequently consulted their conception with a doctor post-transplantation (74 versus 88%, p = .064). The number of unplanned pregnancies decreased post-transplantation (34 versus 20%, p = .051). The mean time elapsed from an organ transplant to unintended conception was 27.0 ± 12.5 (3.0–63.0) months. Women with longer (>24 months) rather than shorter (≤24 months) time elapsed from the transplant became pregnant less frequently (38 versus 15%, p = .060). In 70% (38/54) of unplanned pregnancies women did not use any birth control. All cases of conceptions within the post-transplant year were unintentional. Every third woman, who underwent the transplantation up to 1 year before the study enrolment, was unaware of the necessity to prevent the pregnancy.

Conclusions: Although unwanted pregnancies occur more frequently in the early post-transplant period, it seems that women after kidney or liver transplantation seem to plan their pregnancies more carefully.

Keywords:

• Family planning
• pregnancy
• transplantation
• unplanned conception

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.