Pregnancy complications following legally induced abortion with special reference to abortion technique.

A study of 576 pregnant women, whose previous pregnancy had been terminated by legally induced abortion, has shown that the rate of pregnancy and delivery complications could not be correlated with the interval between the abortion and the subsequent pregnancy, nor with the gestational age at the time of abortion, nor the number of previous induced abortions. Neither was the abortion technique found to correlate with the frequency of complications in a subsequent pregnancy. It was found, however, that more infants with a birth weight below 2 501 grams were born to women whose cervical canal during abortion had been dilated more than 12 mm, and by women who had been submitted to récurettage. The latter group also demonstrated a higher frequency of retained placenta or placental tissue.