FUPEC study, a prospective open-cohort on severe pre-eclampsia and cardiovascular risk factors based in the Netherlands

Abstract

Purpose The FUPEC (Follow-Up Pre-EClampsia) study aims to investigate the presence and development of cardiovascular risk factors, cardiovascular disease, as well as cardiovascular health following a pregnancy complicated by severe pre-eclampsia.Participants The FUPEC study is an open-cohort study conducted within routine care at the FUPEC clinic at Erasmus Medical Center in the Netherlands. This clinic is specifically designed for the cardiovascular follow-up of patients who have experienced severe pre-eclampsia. Women with a history of severe pre-eclampsia are invited to the FUPEC clinic at 6 weeks, 3 months, 1 year and every 2 years thereafter postpartum until they are 50 years of age. Clinical and biochemical data are routinely collected, encompassing pregnancy characteristics and outcomes, anthropometric measurements, cardiovascular risk factors, cardiovascular health scores, carotid intima-media thickness—including vascular age and ambulatory blood pressure measurements. Additionally, blood and urine samples are collected and stored in a biobank.Findings to date The first patient was enrolled in April 2011. As of March 2024, a total number of 1268 women have been enrolled in the FUPEC study, with an annual enrolment rate of 100–150 new patients. At inclusion, women had a median age of 33.5 years (IQR 30.1–37.9). At their first FUPEC visit, women were a median of 4.9 months (1.9–29.4) after delivery. At the first visit, the median body mass index was 25.7 (IQR 23.0–29.9) kg/m2, 23.4% of participants were using antihypertensive medication and 6.4% were smoking. Preliminary analyses of 24-hour blood pressure patterns and carotid intima-media thickness have previously been conducted on a subset of the cohort, with details provided in the ‘Findings to Date’ section.Future plans The FUPEC cohort serves as a robust clinical data source and biobank that can be used for future studies and collaborative research answering, for example, questions on the aetiology, risk factors and short-term and long-term complications of pregnancies complicated by severe pre-eclampsia. Since the FUPEC cohort is integrated with routine care, there is no strict completion of data collection, allowing for flexible data acquisition.