The Characteristics and Outcomes of Women Admitted with Preeclampsia at JOOTRH: A Review of June 2021 to December 2021

Abstract

Preeclampsia is a hypertensive disorder in pregnancy occurring after 20 weeks of gestation and characterised by elevated blood pressure, proteinuria and oedema. It is one of the feared complications in pregnancy and contributes to maternal and perinatal morbidity and mortality. However, in Kisumu County and western Kenya in general there is no recent publication on risk factors and prevalence of preeclampsia and its contribution to maternal and perinatal morbidity and mortality The objective of this study was to determine the characteristics and outcomes of women admitted with preeclampsia at Jaramogi Oginga Odinga Teaching and Referral Hospital in Kisumu County in Western Kenya. The purposive sampling technique was used and women diagnosed with preeclampsia within the study period were included while those without preeclampsia were excluded. Data collection was by retrospective review of medical records where 80 files were reviewed. The records were obtained from files in the Hospital’s records department. The collected data was analysed using descriptive statistics involving the calculation of means, frequencies and standard deviation. The analyzed data was then presented in pie charts, tables and bar graphs which aided in interpretation. Ethical approval for the study was obtained from the Jaramogi Oginga Odinga Teaching and Referral Hospital Ethics Review Committee (JOOTHERC). The finding revealed that the majority of the women 31.25% were below 24 years old. Secondly, primiparity and parity of 1 accounted for 55% of the subjects while 9% had a parity of more than 4 and 36% had a parity of 2 to 3. Third, 26% of the women had a history of chronic hypertension and 11% of the women had a history of diabetic mellitus. Fourth, 80% of the women had a singleton pregnancy. Fifth, 77% of the women had mild preeclampsia at the time of diagnosis. Sixth, 51% of women had no complications while for those who complicated, 24% developed severe preeclampsia, 16%progressed to eclampsia, 5 % went into acute renal failure, 3% had pulmonary oedema and 1% succumbed from preeclampsia complications. Seventh, perinatal outcomes were 16% had IUFD, 15% were delivered preterm and those with respiratory distress were at 13%. In conclusion, common risk factors of preeclampsia included age less than 24 years and primiparity. The majority of the women had mild preeclampsia at the time of diagnosis. The majority of the women had no complications while the common complications recorded were eclampsia and severe preeclampsia with a few developing acute renal failure, pulmonary edema and death. Intrauterine fetal death, preterm delivery and respiratory distress were the common neonatal complications. The study recommends that attention be focused on primigravidas in prenatal care and antenatally focusing on preeclampsia counselling and Blood pressure monitoring