Original ArticlesPoststerilization regret: findings from the United States collaborative review of sterilization☆
Section snippets
Methods
The methods for the Collaborative Review of Sterilization, a prospective multicenter study, have been described.6, 7, 8 Participating medical centers were located in Baltimore, Maryland; Buffalo, New York; Chapel Hill, North Carolina; Honolulu, Hawaii; Houston, Texas; Memphis, Tennessee; Sacramento, California; St. Louis, Missouri; and San Francisco, California. The study was approved by the institutional review board at each center.
Women were enrolled from 1978 to 1987 and were eligible for
Results
Consideration of demographic and reproductive characteristics showed that the study population was racially diverse and that the majority of participants were married, underwent interval laparoscopic sterilization procedures, and had elected tubal sterilization for contraceptive rather than medical reasons (Table 1). Half of the participants were 30 years or younger at the time of sterilization. The mean follow-up time was 6.5 years. Among the women eligible for interview at 1, 3, 5, and 8–14
Discussion
The cumulative probability of expressing regret during follow-up interviews within 14 years after tubal sterilization was 20% for women who were aged 30 years or younger when sterilized. Young women sterilized within 1 year after the birth of their youngest child were just as likely to experience regret at some point as were women sterilized during the immediate postpartum period. Poststerilization regret decreased as the time since the birth of the youngest child increased. A large number of
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Supported by an interagency agreement (3-YO2-HD41075-10) with the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development.
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The U.S. Collaborative Review of Sterilization Working Group: Herbert B. Peterson, MD, Joyce M. Hughes, Zhisen Xia, PhD, Lynne S. Wilcox, MD, and Lisa Ratliff Tylor, Atlanta, Georgia; James Trussell, PhD, Princeton, New Jersey; Norman G. Courey, MD, CM, Buffalo, New York; Philip D. Darney, MD, MSc, San Francisco, California; Ernst R. Friedrich, MD, St. Louis, Missouri; Ralph W. Hale, MD, Washington, DC; Roy T. Nakayama, MD, Honolulu, Hawaii; Jaroslav F. Hulka, MD, Chapel Hill, North Carolina; Alfred N. Poindexter, MD, Houston, Texas; George M. Ryan, MD and Frank Ling, MD, Memphis, Tennessee; Gary K. Stewart, MD, Sacramento, California; and Howard A. Zacur, MD, Baltimore, Maryland.