Maternal Cardiac Diastolic Dysfunction by Doppler Echocardiography in Women with Preeclampsia

Preeclampsia may lead to heart failure in late pregnancy and early puerperium. Diastolic dysfunction may be the cause of heart failure in these patients. There is paucity of data on diastolic dysfunction in patients with preeclampsia.

To assess cardiac diastolic dysfunction in women with preeclampsia by Doppler echocardiography and to correlate severity of dysfunction with severity of preeclampsia.

One hundred and fifty nulliparous women in age group of 20-35 years were recruited for the study. Among these, 120 women with preeclampsia were taken as cases and 30 normotensive women as controls. Doppler echocardiography was carried out between 28-36 weeks of gestation in both groups to assess and grade severity of diastolic dysfunction.

Of 120 women with preeclampsia, 61 had mild preeclampsia and 59 had severe preeclampsia. Diastolic dysfunction was seen in 25(20.8%) cases. Among these, grade I diastolic dysfunction was seen in 40% and the rest 60% had grade II diastolic dysfunction. In the mild preeclampsia group, only 2(3.3%) patients had diastolic dysfunction. Both had grade I dysfunction. Of severe preeclampsia patients, 8(13.6%) had grade I and 15(25.4%) had grade II diastolic dysfunction (p=0.001). None of these progressed to heart failure or pulmonary oedema. Systolic function assessed by left ventricular ejection fraction was normal in all cases. All controls had normal systolic and diastolic functions.

Cardiac diastolic dysfunction occurred in one-fifth of women with preeclampsia. Grade of diastolic dysfunction correlated with the severity of preeclampsia.