OBJECTIVE To assess the relation between serum leptin levels and lipid profile in women with pre-eclampsia and to evaluate their atherogenic role in the pathophysiology of pre-eclampsia. METHODS This was a comparative cross-sectional study, carried out in the Department of Physiology, Basic Medical Sciences Institute, Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre (JPMC), in collaboration with the depart...

OBJECTIVE To investigate the incidence of retinal vein occlusion (RVO) in pregnant women and in the subpopulation of pregnant women with pre-eclampsia/eclampsia compared to that in the age-matched general female population to determine if there is increased risk of RVO in pregnancy. DESIGN Nationwide population-based retrospective study using data entered into the Korean national health claim...

OBJECTIVES To determine whether pre-eclampsia, hypothesised to be an inflammatory condition, is associated with fever in term labour, and confirm and examine the reported association of pre-eclampsia at term with neonatal encephalopathy. DESIGN Prospective cohort study. SETTING A Dublin teaching hospital. PARTICIPANTS 6163 women in labour with singleton pregnancies at term at low risk for...

STUDY QUESTION Are low serum concentrations of human chorionic gonadotrophin (hCG) in very early pregnancy associated with pre-eclampsia risk? SUMMARY ANSWER Low hCG concentrations in very early pregnancy are associated with increased risk of severe pre-eclampsia. WHAT IS KNOWN ALREADY Low maternal serum concentrations of hCG early in pregnancy may indicate impaired proliferation or invasio...

Pre-eclampsia is a major cause of maternal and fetal mortality in pregnancy. The identification of genetic variants which predispose to pre-eclampsia demands large DNA collections from affected mothers and babies and controls, with reliable supporting phenotypic data. The InterPregGen study has assembled a consortium of researchers from Europe, Central Asia and South America with the aim of elu...

OBJECTIVE To develop a predictive model for pre-eclampsia using clinical, biochemical and ultrasound markers during the first trimester of pregnancy. METHODS This was a nested case-control study within a pre-eclampsia screening project that involved 5367 asymptomatic pregnant women undergoing routine transvaginal uterine artery (UtA) Doppler at 11 + 0 to 13 + 6 weeks. Following exclusions, th...

Pre-eclampsia is increasingly recognized as more than an isolated disease of pregnancy. Women who have had a pregnancy complicated by pre-eclampsia have a 4-fold increased risk of later cardiovascular disease. Intriguingly, the offspring of affected pregnancies also have an increased risk of higher blood pressure and almost double the risk of stroke in later life. Experimental approaches to ide...

The molecular mechanisms of pre-eclampsia are being increasingly clarified in animals and humans. With the uncovering of these mechanisms, preventive therapy strategies using chronic infusion of adrenomedullin, vascular endothelial growth factor-121 (VEGF-121), losartan, and sildenafil have been proposed to block narrow spiral artery formation in the placenta by suppressing related possible fac...

OBJECTIVE To compare clinical signs of puberty onset in daughters of pre-eclampsia and normotensive pregnancies. DESIGN Population based follow-up study. METHODS In a cohort of 120 daughters of pre-eclampsia pregnancies and 203 daughters of pregnancies without pre-eclampsia, pubic hair growth and breast development were assessed at 11, 12 and 13 years of age by Tanner scores and by self-ass...