Incidence of Pulmonary and/or Systemic Thromboembolism in Pregnancy

Pregnancy associate with thromboembolism is one of leading causes of maternal morbidity and mortality. Worldwide the incidence of pregnancy related venous thromboembolism is approximately 1 in 1500 deliveries. The arterial thromboembolism risk is increased from 3 to 4 fold and the risk of venous thromboembolism is five times higher in a pregnant that in a non-pregnant woman. With an appropriate prophylaxis and therapy, prevention of death from systemic thromboembolism in pregnancy necessitates a high index of clinical suspicion succeeded by a timely and accurate diagnostic approach. In pregnancy the clinical diagnosis of systemic thromboembolism is notoriously difficult due to the overlap of signs and symptoms between the pulmonary embolus with or without deep venous thrombosis. We performed a retrospective study of 86 pregnant women with Pulmonary thromboembolism (PTE) and Deep venous thrombosis (DVT) diagnosed between 2009-2015 in Obstetrics-Gynecology Clinic 1 at Emergency County Hospital of Craiova. Our study evaluated these cases considering frequency, maternal and fetus risk associated with thromboembolism. In 6 years we had 35 women diagnosed as PTE, 8 women diagnosed as DVT and PTE, and 43 patients diagnosed as DVT. The underlying disease in our study was hypertension and the most frequent symptoms reported were dyspnea and limb swelling.(100%).During the third trimester of pregnancy the incidence of PTE was 45% and DVT 57%. 12 cases of DVT were related to thrombophilia. Also we found 25 % of PTE that occurred after cesarean and 8 % of PTE after vaginal delivery. We notice that vaginal delivery is safer than cesarean surgery. Also the importance of third trimester of pregnancy and postpartum it is evident.