Pulmonary Embolism in Pregnancy
- One in 1,000 to 10,000 pregnancies in prenatal period
- Risk of PE increases five fold during pregnancy
- Risk of PE increases with successive trimester and puerperal period (some studies demonstrated equal risks among different trimesters)
- Mortality up to 15-30%
- PE is a preventable cause of maternal death
Clinical Problems
- Difficult clinical diagnosis because of several conditions can mimic PE in pregnant patients, including normal physiologic change of pregnancy
- D-dimer assay not helpful if positive
Imaging Diagnosis
- No current standard guideline for imaging of PE in pregnant patients
- Algorithm depends on institutional preference, resource availability and individual radiologist/physician practice pattern
- Usual first-line imaging tests are chest radiography and lower extremity ultrasound
Reference:
Pahade JK, et al. Imaging pregnant patients with suspected pulmonary embolism: what the radiologist needs to know. Radiographics 2009; 10.1148/rg.293085226 (published online ahead of print on March 30, 2009)
No comments:
Post a Comment