ReviewObstetricEffects of birth spacing on maternal health: a systematic review
Section snippets
Materials and Methods
The systematic review was conducted following a protocol specifically designed for this purpose and reported through use of the checklist proposed by the meta-analysis of Observational Studies in Epidemiology (MOOSE) group for reporting of systematic reviews of observational studies.7
We performed an initial literature search in MEDLINE (1966 to March 2006), EMBASE (1980 to March 2006), POPLINE (1980 to March 2006), CINAHL (1982 to March 2006), LILACS (1982 to March 2006), and ECLA (1980 to
Results
The searches produced 653 citations, of which 55 were considered relevant. The computerized search located 53, 1 was found in proceedings of meetings on birth spacing, and the remaining 1 was found through contact with a relevant researcher in the field. Thirty-three studies were excluded, the main reasons being the lack of data on the relationship between birth spacing and adverse outcomes considered (48%) and the lack of adjustment for confounding factors at statistical analysis (36%). A list
Comment
Birth spacing is promoted as an important component of family-planning strategies. However, there has been little information available to quantify the relationship between birth spacing and maternal health. Our systematic review shows that long interpregnancy intervals, possibly longer than 5 years, are independently associated with an increased risk of preeclampsia. There was emerging evidence that women with long interpregnancy intervals are at increased risk for labor dystocia and that
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This study was supported by the Office of Population and Reproductive Health, Bureau for Global Health, U.S. Agency for International Development under the terms of Cooperative Agreements HRN-A-00-00-00003-00 and GPO-A-00-05-00027-0 awarded to the CATALYST Consortium.
The content of the paper has not been influenced by the sponsor.