What are the risk factors for developing PID?
Risk factors for PID are:
- Young age
- In general practice
,PID is most common in women aged 20-24 years, but incidence has been falling in this demographic group. The most common cause is a sexually transmitted infection.
- In the hospital setting, PID is most common in women aged 35-44 years and incidence is relatively stable in this group. The causative organism is less likely to be sexually transmitted.
- In general practice
- Multiple sexual partners
- New recent sexual partner(s) in the last 3 months
- History of sexually transmitted infection (STI) in the patient or their partner(s)
- Not using barrier contraception
- Recent gynaecological procedures which cause disruption of the endocervical barrier and translocate bacteria into the upper genital tract such as:
- termination of pregnancy
- intrauterine device (IUD) insertion in the last 4-6wks
- in vitro fertilisation3