Maternal death due to COVID-19.

BACKGROUND: Despite 2.5 million infections and 169,000 deaths worldwide (as of April 20, 2020), no maternal deaths and only a few pregnant women afflicted with severe respiratory morbidity have been reported to be related to COVID-19 disease. Given the disproportionate burden of severe and fatal respiratory disease previously documented among pregnant women following other coronavirus-related outbreaks (SARS-CoV in 2003 and MERS-CoV in 2012) and influenza pandemics over the last century, the absence of reported maternal morbidity and mortality with COVID-19 disease is unexpected. OBJECTIVE: To describe maternal and perinatal outcomes and death in a case series of pregnant women with COVID-19 disease. STUDY DESIGN: We describe here a multiinstitution adjudicated case series from Iran that includes 9 pregnant women diagnosed with severe COVID-19 disease in their second or third trimester. All 9 pregnant women received a diagnosis of SARS-CoV-2 infection by reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction nucleic acid testing. Outcomes of these women were compared with their familial/household members with contact to the affected patient on or after their symptom onset. All data were reported at death or after a minimum of 14 days from date of admission with COVID-19 disease. RESULTS: Among 9 pregnant women with severe COVID-19 disease, at the time of reporting, 7 of 9 died, 1 of 9 remains critically ill and ventilator dependent, and 1 of 9 recovered after prolonged hospitalization. We obtained self-verified familial/household cohort data in all 9 cases, and in each and every instance, maternal outcomes were more severe compared with outcomes of other high- and low-risk familial/household members (n=33 members for comparison). CONCLUSION: We report herein maternal deaths owing to COVID-19 disease. Until rigorously collected surveillance data emerge, it is prudent to be aware of the potential for maternal death among pregnant women diagnosed as having COVID-19 disease in their second or third trimester.

A comparative study of fennel and dimethicone capsule effects on flatulence rate after cesarean section: A double-blind randomized controlled trial.

BACKGROUND: Flatulence is one of the gastrointestinal complaints after a cesarean section (C-section). A host of treatments have been used to reduce this symptom in hospitals, and most of them are based on chemical drugs. It is considered that herbal drugs may have fewer side effects than chemical drugs, and it seems that fennel can reduce flatulence through stimulation of bowel movements. This study compared the efficacy of fennel and dimethicone capsules on the flatulence rate in post-cesarean birth women. MATERIALS AND METHODS: This study was a parallel double-blind randomized controlled trial, conducted in a teaching hospital. Eligible women who underwent a C-section and had the sensation of flatulence were randomly block allocated to the fennel and dimethicone groups (1:1). Each group received drugs every 6 hours for four doses after restarting oral feeding. Flatulence rate was the main variable measured before and one hour after taking each dose by the visual analog scale (VAS). Data were analyzed by statistical tests including repeated-measures analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) based on the intention-to-treat method in Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) version 16.0. RESULTS: The dimethicone group showed a significant reduction in flatulence (F (7,245) =198.5, P < 0.001, η2 p = 0.850). The same trend was also obtained for the fennel group (F (7,266) =215.0, P < 0.001, η2 p = 0.849). However, there was no difference between groups on the flatulence level after adjusting for the baseline level of flatulence (F (1,72) =0.27, P = 0.607, η2 p = 0.004). The same result was also obtained one hour after taking capsule 4 (F (1,72) =0.63, P = 0.430, η2 p = 0.009). CONCLUSION: Both fennel and dimethicone capsules can reduce flatulence rate after C-section, although there was no significant difference among them.

A bibliometric analysis of Intrauterine Growth Restriction research.

Intrauterine growth restriction (IUGR) is not a new subject in pregnancy. Nevertheless, this concept has newly begun to be integrated into pregnancy studies. We recognized articles that were published in English from 1977 to 2019 through electronic searches of the Web of Science™ database. The WoS database was searched for all published articles that compared preeclampsia from 1977 to January 2020. About 1469 documents in obstetrics and gynecology areas were analyzed in WoS database. VOSviewer software was employed to visualize the networks. The survey resulted in a 1469 published documents from 1977 to 2020. 'Gratacos' from Spain and 'Cetin' from Italy contributed the most publications. The greatest contribution came from the 'USA' (n = 498), 'Italy' (n = 155), and 'England' (n = 147). Furthermore, our results found that among these journals, the 'AJOG' (n = 318) and the 'Reproductive Sciences' (n = 209) published the largest number of papers. The top 100 most cited papers showed that 30% were reported in the 'AJOG'. About half the articles were published in the last decade and the most common studies were research paper (77%). The co-occurrence and co-citation analysis showed that the study formed four clusters. Finally, the strategic map was designed. We found that there existed an increasing trend in the large amount of publication on IUGR from 1977 to 2020. The number of studies in IUGR has substantially improved in the last decade. Authors from the 'USA' appeared the most proactive in addressing the IUGR area. By studying these articles, we propose important to support not only for grinding the IUGR challenges field but also for designing a new trend in this area.