[Investigation of the association between autoantibodies and recurrent abortions]

Two hundred and forty five patients with recurrent abortions were studied for autoantibodies in this paper. The total positive rate of autoantibodies was found to be 18.4% (45/245). The presence of antiphospholipid antibodies was in 33 (13.5%), antinuclear antibodies in 17 (6.9%) and anti-ENA in 7 (2.9%) patients. According to the clinical data, these 45 patients were classified into three types: (1) cases with antiphospholipid antibodies; (2) cases with anti-ENA (SLE); (3) cases with simple antinuclear antibodies. All the patients except SLE cases were treated with low-dose prednisone (5 mg/day) and aspirin (60-80 mg/day). The total pregnancy success rate was 80.0%. Excluding SLE cases, the success rate was up to 92.9%. The outcome of pregnancy was usually related to whether the autoantibodies especially LAC turned negative or not. Hemorheology and coagulative state in 19 patients with autoantibodies revealed hypercoagulative condition. It suggests that autoantibodies may cause intravascular coagulation leading to recurrent abortions.