Pregnancy rates after surgical sterilization higher than expected: Study

Study highlights are as follows:

• A total of post-sterilization pregnancy claims were identified for 4.74% of women after hysteroscopic sterilization and 5.57% after laparoscopic sterilization. The pregnancy rates decreased overtime after both the procedures.
• The crude incidence of pregnancy claims was higher for hysteroscopic sterilization than for laparoscopic sterilization after a yea of the procedure (3.26:2.61 per 100 woman-years)
• Between 13 and 24 months after the procedure, Fewer pregnancies for women after hysteroscopic sterilizations were observed than for those after laparoscopic sterilizations by 13 to 24 months, with no statistical differences in later years.
• The cumulative pregnancy rates 5 years after sterilization were lower with hysteroscopic sterilization than with laparoscopic sterilization (6.26:7.22 per 100 woman-years; propensity-weighted, adjusted risk ratio, 0.76). 

By the end of the study, the authors concluded that the findings reassure hysteroscopic sterilization was not inferior to laparoscopic sterilization.

Reference:

Gariepy, A. M., Lewis, C., Zuckerman, D., Tancredi, D. J., Murphy, E., McDonald-Mosley, R., Sonalkar, S., Hathaway, M., Nunez-Eddy, C., & Schwarz, E. B. (2022). Comparative effectiveness of hysteroscopic and laparoscopic sterilization for women: a retrospective cohort study. In Fertility and Sterility. Elsevier BV. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.fertnstert.2022.03.001