But the risk for individual women remains extremely low, particularly in younger women.
Danish researchers wrote in the New England Journal of Medicine that the findings suggest a higher risk of stroke in particular for women using vaginal rings, and possibly hormonal skin patches -- though the second finding was based on a smaller group of women and could have been due to chance.
Dr. James Simon, a women's health researcher at George Washington University in Washington, D.C. told Reuters Health other factors -- such as the belief that a patch or a ring might be safer for women thought to be at risk -- may explain the higher rate of stroke in that group.
Simon, who wasn't involved in the new research, said the findings probably shouldn't change how doctors prescribe birth control. The risks seen in the study, he said, pale in comparison to the risks of stroke, heart attack or death faced by women who get pregnant.
"None of the hormonal contraceptives studied
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