Management of intractable postpartum haemorrhage in a tertiary center: A 5-year experience

The purpose of this study is to describe treatment alternatives to prevent postpartum hysterectomy after failure of conventional therapies. Prevention of hysterectomy was the main outcome studied.

This is a retrospective study of 19 patients diagnosed to have intractable postpartum hemorrhage and not managed with medical treatment who were subsequently treated with operative interventions in our unit between January 2004 and January 2009. The cases were identified by review of medical records.

In the period under review, a total of 17,341 deliveries were conducted, out of which 19 women were managed for intractable PPH. The incidence of severe PPH unresponsive to standard medical treatment was 0.1%. The mean maternal age was 33.5±3.4 years (range 27-39 years). The mean gestational age was 38.3±1.3 weeks (range 37-41 weeks). Organ preserving surgery methods were utilized in all the patients with a success rate 78.9%. The mean duration of surgery was 95 minutes (range 50-130 minutes) and the mean hospital stay was for 5 days. The mean transfused blood volume was 2.4 units as packed red cells. Among these 19 cases, 4 cases were resorted to hysterectomy.

In the presence of uncontrolled hemorrhage, this simple procedure should be tried before other complex treatment alternatives are undertaken. Our case series suggests that the combination of uterine artery ligation with B-Lynch sutures might be the best surgical approach because it preserves future fertility better than other methods and avoids high operative risks and morbidity.