Reproductive
Women’s pregnancy history and partners’ cardiovascular mortality Liv Grimstvedt Kvalvik* Liv Grimstvedt Kvalvik Rolv Skjærven Gerhard Sulo Aditi Singh Quaker Harmon Allen Wilcox
Background: A woman’s full pregnancy history is associated with her risk of dying from atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease (CVD). We assessed whether a woman’s total pregnancy history is associated with her spouse’s risk of dying from CVD.
Methods: In this population-based, prospective study we used data from Norwegian registries including The Medical Birth Registry of Norway, in the period 1967-2020. We identified 566 187 men born after 1944 and registered as partner to women with a pregnancy in 1967 or later, and surviving to age 40. The main outcome is premature CVD mortality (up to age 69) across their partners reproductive history by categories of combined parity (1, 2, 3, or 4 recorded pregnancies) and number of complicated pregnancies (preterm delivery <35 gestational weeks, preeclampsia, placental abruption, perinatal death (stillbirth or death within first 7 days) and term or near-term birth weight <2700grams). Men whose partners had three pregnancies and no complications had lowest CVD risk and served as the reference group. Estimates were adjusted for women’s birth year.
Results: For fathers contributing with up to two pregnancies, the risk of premature CVD increased with increasing number of complicated pregnancies. For men contributing to 3-4 pregnancies, the shape of the association was less clear, peaking at two complications [HR=1.8; 95% confidence interval 1.2-2.8).
Conclusions: While the number of pregnancy complications seem to increase CVD mortality for women in a linear pattern, this seem not to be the case for their partners. Pregnancy history seems to be less useful in prediction of men’s risk of dying from CVD. CVD risk factors are known to increase risk of pregnancy complications. However, the correlations between partners of diet, SES, and other CVD risk factors is apparently not strong enough to produce a strong pregnancy-related CVD risk in male partners.