TPAL (medicine)

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TPAL is one of the methods to provide a quick overview of a female's obstetric history. Two other methods often used are gravida/para and GPA.

In TPAL, the T refers to term births (after 37 weeks gestation), the P refers to premature births (20 to 37 weeks gestation), the A refers to abortions, and the L refers to living children. The TPAL is described by numbers separated by hyphens. Multiple births (twins, triplets and higher multiples) count as one birth. For example, a pregnant woman who carried one pregnancy to term with a surviving infant; carried one pregnancy to 35 weeks with surviving twins; carried one pregnancy to 9 weeks as an ectopic (tubal) pregnancy; and has 3 living children would have a TPAL annotation of T1, P1, A1, L3. This could also be written as 1-1-1-3. Note, the abortions number refers to the total number of induced abortions or miscarriages or ectopic pregnancies.

Reference

1. Cunningham, G. K., et. al. (2001). William's obstetrics (21st ed.) Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice-Hall Publishing. pg. 223-224