Women With Preeclampsia Have Increased Risk of Later Hypertension, CKD

FRIDAY, June 26, 2026 (HealthDay News) — Women with preeclampsia have increased risk of developing hypertension and chronic kidney disease (CKD) later in life, according to a study published online May 19 in BJOG: An International Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology.

Anne Høy Seemann Vestergaard, M.D., Ph.D., from Aarhus University in Denmark, and colleagues conducted a nationwide, population-based cohort study using routinely collected individual-level data from medical databases for 1998 to 2018, with follow-up through 2021. Data were included for all pregnancies ≥20 weeks among women aged 15 years or older (286,078 pregnant women).

The researchers found that 3.3 percent of the women developed preeclampsia, which was associated with elevated risks of later hypertension, CKD, or cardiovascular disease (CVD). The 10-year risks were 11.9, 1.2, and 1.1 percent for hypertension, CKD, and CVD among women with preeclampsia with no/mild urinary protein excretion (UPE) and 16.0, 5.1, and 1.2 percent, respectively, with moderate/severe UPE.

“The most surprising finding was how clearly the amount of protein in the urine during preeclampsia was linked to the risk of later high blood pressure and chronic kidney disease,” Vestergaard said in a statement. “Women with moderate to severe protein excretion had a higher risk of both conditions compared with women with low or no protein excretion.”

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