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It occurs when a woman with normal blood pressure suddenly develops high blood pressure and protein in her urine or other problems after 20 weeks of pregnancy.
Women who suffer from preeclampsia during pregnancy are at least three times more likely to suffer strokes later in life than women who have no history of the condition, according to scientists at the University of Utah Health in the United States. Based on this finding, the researchers recommend that women who have had preeclampsia be carefully monitored in the years after their onset.
"Our study strongly suggests that for women with a history of preeclampsia, doctors should consider aggressive treatment of midlife vascular risk factors, such as high blood pressure and elevated cholesterol and glucose levels -- "Doing this could potentially reduce these women's risk of stroke," said Dr. Adam de Havenon, senior author of the study and assistant professor of neurology at U of U Health.
Preeclampsia occurs when a woman who previously had normal blood pressure suddenly develops high blood pressure and protein in the urine or other problems after 20 weeks of pregnancy. If left untreated, preeclampsia can cause serious complications for both mother and child.
Previous research found a link between preeclampsia and stroke, but did not follow the women into middle age or observe the development of stroke risk factors such as hypertension, cholesterol, blood glucose or smoking.
In their study, published in the journal JAMA Network Open, De Havenon and her colleagues analyzed data from 1.435 women who had given birth and were participating in the Framingham Heart Study, an epidemiological study that followed a group of individuals throughout the year. over time to determine the natural history of cardiovascular diseases, including stroke. The participants' health was evaluated every two years, from 1948 to 2016. None of the women had suffered a stroke before enrolling in the Framingham study. However, 169 of them had preeclampsia before participating. Women with this disease were more likely to be younger, smoke, have higher diastolic blood pressure, and receive treatment for high cholesterol than other women evaluated.
During a mean follow-up of 32 years, 231 women suffered a stroke. After accounting for the development of traditional vascular risk factors over time, a history of preeclampsia was independently associated with a 3,8-fold increased risk of later stroke. Although researchers acknowledge that much is still unknown about the relationship between preeclampsia and stroke, they suspect that preeclampsia may cause more long-term damage than previously thought, making women more susceptible to stroke as they age. .
"Preeclampsia is a complicated disease that involves damage to the lining of blood vessels," says Lauren Theilen, MD, MSCI, senior author of the study and assistant professor of obstetrics and gynecology at U of U Health. "We used to think that "It just happened while you were pregnant and then got better. But preeclampsia can cause lasting damage to your blood vessels."
Looking ahead, Theilen is exploring various physiological mechanisms that could help explain how and why preeclampsia, along with other vascular risk factors, increases the risk of stroke among women.
