FETAL GROWTH-RETARDATION IN INFANTS OF MULTIPAROUS AND NULLIPAROUS WOMEN WITH PREECLAMPSIA

OBJECTIVE: Infants of women with preeclampsia are considered at high r isk of fetal growth retardation. The purpose of our study was to deter mine whether this risk differed by parity. STUDY DESIGN: We compared t he outcomes of 133 case patients with preeclampsia (101 nulliparous wo men and 32 multiparous women) and 132 normotensive control patients (5 2 nulliparous women and 80 multiparous women) who delivered at Norther n California Kaiser Permanente hospitals between 1984 and 1985. RESULT S: Women with preeclampsia were more likely than control patients to d eliver a small-for-gestational-age infant (adjusted odds ratio 7.0, 95 % confidence interval 2.8 to 18.1). After we controlled for smoking st atus, age, Quetelet index, and race, multiparous women with preeclamps ia were at greater risk of having a small-for-gestational-age infant ( adjusted odds ratio 29.4, 95% confidence interval 5.2 to 167.5) than w ere nulliparous women (adjusted odds ratio 4.1, 95% confidence interva l 1.2 to 14.1) when compared with normotensive control patients of sim ilar parity. Although multiparous women with preeclampsia had higher m ean arterial pressures and somewhat earlier onsets of elevated mean ar terial pressure than nulliparous women with preeclampsia, neither of t hese variables predicted whether the infants would be small for gestat ional age. CONCLUSION: Multiparous women with preeclampsia are at high er risk of having an infant with fetal growth retardation than are nul liparous women with preeclampsia.