REPRODUCTIVE OUTCOME AFTER EXPOSURE TO SURGERY UNDER ANESTHESIA DURING PREGNANCY

The objective of the study was to examine the teratogenic potential of surgery under anesthesia during pregnancy in the large population-bas ed dataset of the Hungarian Case-Control Surveillance of Congenital Ab normalities, 1980-1994. An analysis of cases with congenital abnormali ties and matched healthy controls was performed. Of 35,727 pregnant wo men who had babies without any defects (control group), 73 (0.20%) had had operations under anesthesia. Of 20,830 pregnant women who had off spring with congenital abnormalities, 31 (0.15%) had operations with a nesthesia. There was no higher rate of surgery under anesthesia in any congenital abnormality group. In addition, the case-control pair anal ysis did not show a significantly higher rate of surgery and anesthesi a in the second and third months of gestation in any group of congenit al abnormalities. A lower birth weight was found in healthy newborn in fants born to mothers with surgery during pregnancy, however, it was e xplained by the subgroup with cervical incompetence often treated by c erclage which is of limited efficacy. Surgery under anesthesia does no t appear to present teratogenic risk to the fetus.