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Press Releases
| Seminar from Women & Infants/Brown Featured in Lancet |
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02/05/10
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Pulmonary embolism (PE), a blood clot in an artery to the lung or one of its branches, is the leading medical cause of death in pregnant women in the developed world. Mortality rates may be reduced if clinicians can target the right population for prevention, ensure that diagnosis is adequately investigated when suspected, and initiate the most timely and best possible treatment.
A review of all of the new research about how to identify those women at highest risk for PE in pregnancy has been published in the February 6, 2010 issue of The Lancet, one of the world’s leading medical journals. The seminar was led by Ghada R. Bourjeily, MD, FCCP, board certified internist and pulmonary and critical care medicine specialist in the Center for Women’s Medicine at Women & Infants Hospital and assistant professor in the Department of Medicine at the Alpert Medical School. The seminar team also included Karen Rosene-Montella, MD, chief of medicine at Women & Infants Hospital of Rhode Island, and professor of medicine and obstetrics/gynecology and director of the Division of Obstetric Medicine at The Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University, and was written in collaboration with Hanah Khalil, MD, a Women & Infants’ radiologist; a high-risk obstetrician; and a hematologist.
“The diagnosis and management of pulmonary embolism in pregnant women is complicated because of the many physiological changes that take place during pregnancy,” explained Dr. Rosene-Montella. “Unfortunately, there has not yet been enough research into the best ways to identify those women at risk and how best to treat them. Dr. Bourjeily’s work and her collaboration with colleagues internationally is helping to identify the best imaging strategies to identify clots and determine their clinical significance that may help us safely manage PE in pregnant women.”
Pulmonary embolism is usually caused when a blood clot in the leg travels through the bloodstream to the lungs. The obstruction of the blood flow through the lungs and the pressure on the heart lead to signs and symptoms of PE, including difficulty breathing, chest pain when inhaling, and heart palpitations.
The article by Bourjeily and her team discusses specific risk factors for pulmonary embolism in pregnant women and reviews in detail the advantages and disadvantages of various imaging techniques in this patient population. The article also cautions against extrapolation from the data available on the non-pregnant population and alerts the clinician to the physiologic changes that affect diagnosis and treatment of pregnant women suspected of having PE. |
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