[Magnesium oxide and tocolysis. Our clinical experience and comparison with beta-mimetic (isoxusprine) therapy]

The authors propose the use of oral Magnesium Oxide in the quantity of 200 mg every 3-4 hours for the tocolytic treatment of the pre-term pain, once intravenous tocolysis has decreased or stopped uterine activity (since it has considerably more rapid effect). This treatment constitutes a valid alternative to the use of Beta Mimetic agents in all cases where their use is contraindicated. In the present study, we followed one heterogeneous group of 130 patients, suffering from premature labor hospitalized in our department. After decreasing the uterine contractions by intravenous isossuprine, sixty patients were subsequently treated with magnesium Oxide, fifty with oral isossisuprine, twenty with a simple antispasmodic and the remaining constituted the control group. The percentage of pre-term births has been almost the same in the first two groups (around 17%). The percentage of the patients who exhibited side effects of Beta Mimetic was 30-40%, against 2% of the patients treated with Magnesium Oxide. The intensity of the symptoms was however so slight in the patients treated with Magnesium Oxide, that it failed to disturb the compliance of the patients which allowed to continue the therapy for the necessary period.