Symptomatic Pelvic Organ Prolapse and Self-Rated Health, One Year After Childbirth: A Swedish Nationwide Register Study.

Introduction and hypothesis: Pelvic organ prolapse (POP) is a complication of childbirth that may impair the overall health of women. We hypothesized that women with symptomatic pelvic organ prolapse (sPOP) would rate their health lower than women without sPOP 1 year after childbirth.

Methods: The Swedish National Pregnancy Register, and the Pregnancy Survey were merged and searched for women with data on self-rated health and POP 1 year after childbirth. The women (n = 43,082), who answered these validated questions in the Pregnancy Survey between December 2022 and October 2024 comprised our study population, of which 40,392 were included in the final analysis. Analysis was performed using descriptive statistics and a binary logistic regression model to estimate the associations between self-rated health and sPOP 1 year after childbirth.

Results: In total, 5704 (13.2%) participants reported sPOP; 1617 (28.3%) women with sPOP and 6669 (17.8%) women without sPOP rated their health as poor. sPOP was associated with poor self-rated health 1 year after childbirth (OR 1.557, 95% CI 1.453-1.669). Additionally, the following covariates: low education, urinary incontinence, fecal incontinence, and poor self-rated health before pregnancy were also associated with poor self-rated health 1 year after childbirth.

Conclusions: Women with sPOP had higher odds of reporting poor self-rated health 1 year after childbirth compared to women without sPOP. In Sweden, sPOP represents a public health concern affecting women in their prime years and may lead to poorer health outcomes throughout the rest of their lives.