Women who have tubal sterilization where both fallopian tubes are blocked or cut still run the risk of an ectopic pregnancy, even years later.
Doctors discovered that there had been 47 ectopic pregnancies among the 10,685 women who had tubal sterilization up to 14 years earlier.
The risks of pregnancy varied, depending on the type of tubal sterlization used. Women sterilized by bipolar tubal coagulation had a probability of ectopic pregnancy that was 27 times higher than those who had partial salpingectomy, where the tubes are cut (New Eng J Med, 1997; 336: 762-7).