RESUMEN
Introduction During pregnancy, liver dysfunction is more frequent than expected and may require specialized care. For the early diagnosis, it is important to determine if changes in liver physiology may develop into liver disease. Liver disease during pregnancy may require intervention from a hepatologist for adequate monitoring of mother-fetus health outcomes. This study was aimed to evaluate the clinical profile and predictors of maternal mortality in patients with liver diseases among Asian-Indian-females. Methods We conducted a prospective, open-label, consecutive all-comers study of 2,663 pregnant Asian Indian women admitted in the hospital, which included 92 with liver dysfunction. The medical aspects of the pregnancy were then followed prospectively with laboratory and clinical data during the hospital stay and analyzed. The current study was approved by the Institutional Ethical Committee. Results We found that 92 out of 2,663 patients had liver dysfunction with a prevalence of 3.45%. Fifty-four (58.7%) patients had icterus followed by fever in 23 (25.0%), hypertension in 22 (23.9%), central nervous system manifestations in 21 (22.8%), abdominal pain in 19 (20.6%), vomiting in 19 (20.6%), and pruritus in six (6.5%). Predictors of maternal mortality were icterus (p = 0.04), hepatomegaly (p = 0.04), presenting serum-bilirubin greater than 10 milligram% (mg%) (p = 0.008). The most common etiology was acute viral hepatitis (45.6%), followed by a hypertensive disorder of pregnancy (29.3%), acute fatty liver of pregnancy (1.1%), cholestatic jaundice (9.8%), hyperemesis gravidarum (2.2%), septicemic hepatitis (3.3%), dengue immunoglobulin M (IgM), and plasmodium vivax malaria antigen positive in (2.2%) each. Four patients (4.3%) were leptospira IgM reactive and had co-infection with hepatitis E virus. There was one patient (1.1%) with underlying chronic liver disease. Idiopathic liver disease was present in 5.4% of patients. Conclusion Liver disease is relatively common in Indian pregnant women. It is associated with high maternal and perinatal mortality, even in a tertiary referral center. When managing pregnancy in a tertiary care center, for adequate follow-up of the disease and to prevent adverse consequences for mother and child, it is important to discard liver alterations early. For this purpose, liver disease during pregnancy needs early diagnosis for proper management. Furthermore, it is difficult to manage patients with preexisting liver disease, and it may require specialized intervention from a hepatologist and a gastroenterologist.
RESUMEN
Background Sleep-disordered breathing (SDB) has a potential association with the pathogenesis of congestive heart failure (CHF). We assessed the prevalence and patterns of obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) in patients presenting with CHF. Method This was a prospective, observational, all-comers study of consecutive 77 confirmed cases of CHF. All these patients were clinically assessed and evaluated for OSA with sleep study after routine blood testing, electrocardiogram (ECG), chest X-ray, and echocardiography. Results Of 77 patients with CHF 38 (49.4%) had apnea-hypopnea index (AHI) <5 while 39 (50.6%) had AHI >5. Of these 39, 37 (94.8%) patients showed the clinical features of OSA. The majority (64.9%) of them were males. The majority of OSA (64.9%) had coronary artery disease (CAD) (p<0.05) as the etiology of CHF, followed by dilated cardiomyopathy (32.4%) and valvular heart disease (2.7%). The prevalence of OSA was higher amongst New York Heart Association (NYHA) class 2 (51.4%) as compared to NYHA class 3 (37.8%) and NYHA class 4 (10.8%). There were 12 (32.8%) patients, each having OSA with a heart rate between 71 and 80 bpm and 81 and 90 bpm. Twenty-two (59.5%) had systolic blood pressure (BP) more than 120 mmHg and 20 (54.1%) had diastolic BP more than 80 mmHg. The majority (64.9%) patients had the lowest O2 saturation between 80% and 90%. A significantly large number of patients (62.2%) had ejection fraction 21%-30% (p<0.05). The majority (62.16%) of patients with OSA had AHI between 5 and 15. With 5-15 AHI, 20 (87%) patients with OSA had a snoring, tiredness, observed apnea, high BP, BMI, age, neck circumference, and male gender (STOP-Bang) score between 3 and 7 with AHI 5-15 (p<0.05). Conclusions In our cohort, the prevalence of OSA in CHF was 50.6%. Predictors of OSA in CHF were left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) 20%-30% and NYHA class 2. The majority had AHI between 5 and 15. Sleep apnea screening should be routinely implemented in the evaluation and follow-up of heart failure patients.
RESUMEN
Objective The objective of the study is to identify the predominant determinants of arterial stiffness as assessed by pulse-wave-velocity (PVW) amongst various 24-hour ambulatory blood pressure monitoring (ABPM) parameters in Indian hypertensive subjects. Method Subjects of both genders between 18-60 years with hypertension and who were either drug naïve or on stable anti-hypertensive treatment for at least three months were included in the study. All subjects underwent clinical evaluation with a medical history, biochemical investigations, and assessment of arterial stiffness by PWV along with 24-hour ABPM. Results We found the males were younger than females amongst hypertensive cohort (41.53 ± 10.89 years vs. 52.2 ± 5.17 years, respectively; p=0.001) and had shorter duration of hypertension (41.42 ± 49.14 months vs. 87.8 ± 74.55 months, respectively; p=0.012) and had lower 24-hour average pulse pressure (aPP; 49.1 ± 7.8 mm Hg vs. 57.83 ± 8.92 mm Hg, respectively; p=0.001) at baseline. Younger people (<40-years) as compared to those >40-years of age had the lower carotid-femoral (cf) PWV (972.8 ± 125.0 cm/sec vs. 1165.0 ± 208.4 cm/sec, respectively; p=0.001) and average brachial-ankle (ba) PWV (1413.7 ± 160.4 cm/sec and 1640.0 ± 227.1 cm/sec, respectively; p=0.001). Bivariate analysis revealed that amongst all the 24-hour ABPM parameters, 24-hour aPP had the strongest correlation (r=0.414, p=0.003) with arterial stiffness as assessed by PWV. Also, statistically significant correlation was found in age group <40 years between cf-PWV and both 24-hour aPP (r=0.54, p=0.025) as well as night-time aPP (r=0.59, p=0.013) Conclusion We conclude that 24-hour aPP showed the strongest correlation with arterial stiffness parameters and best correlated with arterial stiffness variables amongst 24-hour ABPM parameters, especially amongst subjects <40 years of age. The pulsatile blood pressure (BP) was a better predictor of aortic PWV than the continuous part of BP.