In a study of pregnant women in the United States, Cedars-Sinai investigators found that a specific imbalance of two placental proteins could predict which women were at risk of developing a severe form of preeclampsia, a life-threatening blood pressure disorder.
The study is published in the journal NEJM Evidence.
“We discovered that a blood test measuring the ratio between two proteins involved in blood vessel development in the placenta could identify which of the women would develop preterm preeclampsia with severe features,” said study co-senior author Sarah Kilpatrick, MD, PhD, chair of the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at Cedars-Sinai. “This test was significantly better than all the standard-of-care markers for preeclampsia with severe features. It predicted with over 90% accuracy whether the patient would develop preeclampsia with severe features or not, while the usual markers were accurate less than 75% of the time.”
The blinded, prospective study of women initially hospitalized for preterm hypertension involved 1,014 patients from18 hospitals across the nation.
“This multicenter investigation is one of a few large studies of the risk for developing preeclampsia with severe features in the U.S. The women represented a more racially diverse cohort than previous studies and included patients from both smaller community hospitals and large academic medical centers, in both cities and rural areas,” said Kilpatrick.
Preeclampsia is the most common hypertensive disorder associated with pregnancy. The severe form of the disease can lead to dangerously high blood pressure, organ failure, vision loss or even stroke. It affects approximately 5% of pregnant women and is a leading cause of maternal and fetal death and serious illness.
Source: Read Full Article