New Delhi— A team of U.S. researchers has developed a simple blood test that can predict preeclampsia—a serious pregnancy complication characterized by high blood pressure.
Preeclampsia, which typically occurs after 20 weeks of gestation, is a leading cause of maternal morbidity and mortality, as well as preterm birth.
Despite using general maternal characteristics to identify women at increased risk, the incidence of preeclampsia has nearly doubled over the past decade.
The newly developed blood test, which analyzes RNA signatures, demonstrated the ability to identify preeclampsia risk in 91 percent of pregnancies.
“By the time a patient shows symptoms, it’s a race against the clock to try to get the baby to term without risking the mother’s health,” said Dr. Kara Rood, a maternal-fetal medicine physician and one of the study’s principal investigators at The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center.
The test can detect preeclampsia risk months before symptoms appear, even in women over the age of 35 who do not have pre-existing high-risk conditions. It is capable of predicting the complication as early as 17.5 to 22 weeks of gestation.
For those who receive a low-risk result, the probability of not developing preterm preeclampsia is 99.7 percent.
“Current guidelines don’t adequately identify which patients are truly at high risk. We need better tools,” Rood said. “This preeclampsia risk prediction test can improve risk assessment, empowering women and their care teams to take informed action that may delay or even prevent the onset of the disease.”
The findings, published in the journal Nature Communications, show that molecular signals from the underlying biology offer a far more accurate assessment of preeclampsia risk than traditional screening methods.
To develop the test, researchers analyzed data from more than 9,000 pregnancies in a multi-center prospective study. They used this data to discover and validate RNA signatures capable of distinguishing between severe and mild hypertensive disorders of pregnancy—including preeclampsia—well before clinical symptoms appear. (Source: IANS)
