A Cross-sectional Study to Investigate the Association Between Obesity and Bacterial Vaginosis Using Nugent Score

Abstract

Bacterial vaginosis is one of the very important vaginal infections with which women report in OPD. Women
with BV are at an increased risk for sexually transmitted infections such as gonorrhea, chlamydia, HIV,
trichomoniasis, urinary tract infection, pelvic inflammatory disease, and adverse pregnancy outcomes that
include preterm birth. Thus, the study was conducted in a tertiary care hospital to understand the correlation
between bacterial vaginosis and obesity and to prevent future gynecological complications in obese women.
A total of 120 women of reproductive age group between 18-45 years and sexually active were enrolled in the
study. Their mean age in completed years was 35.95 ± 7.17 years with the youngest woman being 20 years
old and the eldest being 48 years old. It was observed that the individual who does not have bacterial
vaginosis has 3.22 times the odds to be not obese. This finding was statistically significant(p=0.002). It was
found that the women who had some complications were at 7 times higher odds of being obese as compared
to being not obese. A total of 81 study subjects presented with negative Amsel’s criteria, out of which 29
showed the presence of bacterial vaginosis while the other 52 did not. It was concluded that bacterial
vaginosis is associated with the odds of being from the Obese group of women as compared to the non-obese
women. Moreover, the Nugent score which is a gram-stain-based criterion for diagnosis can be preferred over
Amsel’s criteria for Bacterial Vaginosis