Abstract General Information

Title

WHAT ARE THE CHARACTERISTICS OF PREGNANCY IN MULTIPLE SCLEROSIS? A STUDY IN THE BRAZILIAN POPULATION

Abstract

Introduction: Multiple Sclerosis (MS) is disease of the Central Nervous System with a gender ratio of 3 females to 1 male and an age range between 20-40 years, therefore, young females at a reproductive age.
Objectives: discuss pregnancy in the context of providing care for women with MS
Methods: patients with Multiple Sclerosis, female, aged between 18-45 years, from 01/Nov/2021 to 16/Jan/2022 participated, all of whom answered a questionnaire made available on the Google forms platform.
Results: A total of 233 responses were validated. Most patients had not yet been diagnosed with MS at the time they became pregnant (63.8%), with a statistically significant difference between the two groups in the age factor, i.e., in the group of participants who had not yet been diagnosed before pregnancy, patients were younger (p=0.002). There was no difference in the other variables analyzed, such as difficulty becoming pregnant, relapes during or after childbirth, birth weight, birth length, gestational age at birth, type of childbirth, and breastfeeding. There were no differences in these variables relative to pregnancy planning either.
Conclusion: Patients with an established diagnosis of MS tend to become pregnant later due to factors such as disease control, washout between medications, and socioeconomic factors. This data draws our attention to the fact that the patient diagnosed with MS has an altered perception of her pregnancy, i.e., she tends to delay becoming pregnant. In this way, important point is to provide the patient with objective information so that she can be safe when she becomes pregnant, if she so wishes, without postponing her pregnancy or even giving it up just because she has been diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis.