Women with children may have lower stroke risk, study suggests

Women who have had three or more children may face a lower stroke risk, according to new research.

The findings suggest reproductive factors, especially the number of live births, could help predict future stroke and brain injury risk in women.

Sudha Seshadri, behavioural neurologist, professor and founding director of the Glenn Biggs Institute for Alzheimer’s and Neurodegenerative Diseases at UT Health San Antonio, was joint senior author of the study with Emer R. McGrath of the School of Medicine at the University of Galway in Ireland.

Seshadri said: “Our findings would suggest that reproductive factors, for example, number of live births, may be an additional factor to consider when assessing stroke risk in women.

“Inclusion of this risk factor in female-specific clinical prediction rules for stroke may enhance risk prediction in women.

Seshadri also said: “This may be an important factor to include in female-specific clinical prediction rules for stroke, but will require further study.”

Scientists followed 1,882 women who were free of stroke at a baseline examination between 1998 and 2001, at a mean age of 61. During a median 18-year follow-up, 126 women had strokes.

The team looked at reproductive factors including the number of live births, age at menopause, use of postmenopausal hormone replacement therapy, and blood levels of estradiol and estrone.

Participants were also assessed for “covert brain infarcts”, areas of brain damage caused by reduced blood flow that often do not cause obvious symptoms, and white matter hyperintensity volume, an MRI measure of vascular brain injury.

Using statistical analyses adjusted for major vascular risk factors, the researchers found that having three or more live births was associated with a lower risk of stroke.

Three or more live births were also linked to a lower risk of vascular brain injury.

The researchers found no significant association between other reproductive factors and stroke or MRI markers of vascular brain injury.

The cohort was drawn from the Framingham Heart Study, a long-term and ongoing community-based observational study of residents in Framingham, Massachusetts, dating to 1948.