Article Sidebar
Published:
Feb 10, 2005Keywords:
Article Details
The entire contents of the Tropical Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology are protected under Indian and international copyrights. The Journal, however, grants to all users a free, irrevocable, worldwide, perpetual right of access to, and a license to copy, use, distribute, perform and display the work publicly and to make and distribute derivative works in any digital medium for any reasonable non-commercial purpose, subject to proper attribution of authorship and ownership of the rights. The journal also grants the right to make small numbers of printed copies for their personal non-commercial use.
This journal content is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 License, which allows others to remix, tweak, and build upon the work non-commercially, as long as the author is credited and the new creations are licensed under the identical terms.
Main Article Content
Perinatal Outcome in Patients With Pre-Eclampsia in Benin City, Nigeria
Abstract
Methods: Among 3780 deliveries over a two-and-half year period, 212 singleton infants were born after preeclamptic pregnancies. We compared the perinatal outcome with those of 636 control infants. Pre-eclampsia was defined as (1) an increase in either systolic or diastolic blood preasure (BP) greater than 30mm Hg or 15mmHg respectively above the booking BP plus proteinuria ( > 1+) without simultaneous urinary tract infection. (2) an intrapartum BP > 140 /90mmHg obtained on at least two occasions not less than 6 hours apart during delivery plus presence of proteinuria as indicated in (1) above.
Results: The prevalence of pre-eclampsia was 5.6%; corresponding to 77.9% of all cases of hypertensive disorders in pregnancy. Pre-eclampsia occurred most frequently among women aged 20-24 years (2.7%); corresponding to 48.6% of all cases and whose parity were zero (3.6%); corresponding to 64.2% of all cases. The perinatal mortality rate, the preterm delivery rate and the incidence of birth asphyxia were separately significantly higher in mothers with pre-eclamptic pregnancies than in controls. Mean birth weight was significantly lower in infants delivered after pre-eclamptic pregnancies (2995 + 340g) than after control pregnancies (3105 + 301g). Presence of heavy proteinuria (= 3+) potentiated the adverse effects of pre-eclampsia on perinatal outcome.
Conclusion: Pre-eclampsia commonly complicates pregnancy in young primiparous women. It affects the fetus adversely resulting in fetal growth restriction, preterm delivery, birth asphyxia and sometimes, fetal demise.
Key Words: Pre-Eclampsia, Hypertension, Pregnancy, Proteinuria
[Trop J Obstet Gynaecol, 2004; 21:148-152]
