The role of shear wave elastography in the assessment of placenta previa–accreta

© 2017 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.Objective: To evaluate the value of shear wave elastography (SWE) in the prediction of morbidly adherent placenta. Methods: Forty-three women with normal placental location and 26 women with anteriorly localized placenta previa were recruited for this case-control study. Placental elasticity values in both the groups were determined by SWE imaging. Results: SWE values were higher in the placenta previa group in all regions than in normal localized placentas (p .05). Conclusions: Placental stiffness is significantly higher in placenta previa than normal localized placentas. However, we could not demonstrate any statistically significant difference in the elasticity values between the placenta previa with and without accreta

Evaluation of maternal serum hypoxia inducible factor-1α, progranulin and syndecan-1 levels in pregnancies with early- and late-onset preeclampsia

© 2017 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.Objective: To determine the serum levels of HIF-1 α, progranulin, and syndecan-1 in preeclampsia (PE) and normal pregnancy, and to compare whether these markers demonstrate any difference between early-onset PE (EO-PE) and late-onset PE (LO-PE). Methods: This cross-sectional study was conducted on 27 women with EO-PE, 27 women with LO-PE, and 26 healthy normotensive pregnant controls matched for gestational age. Maternal levels of serum HIF-1 α, progranulin, and syndecan-1 were measured with the use of an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay kit. Results: Statistical analysis revealed significant differences between the control and the PE groups in progranulin (p <.001) and syndecan-1 (p <.001) levels. There were no significant differences in the serum HIF-1 α levels between these groups (p=.069). When PE patients were evaluated by considering subgroups; statistical analysis revealed significant inter-group differences in all biomarkers. Serum progranulin levels were significantly higher in LO-PE compared with the other two groups (EO-PE versus LO-PE and LO-PE versus controls p =.000). Control group presented significantly higher syndecan-1 levels, than EO and LO-PE (p <.001). HIF-1 α levels positively correlated with progranulin levels (r =.439, p=.000). Conclusions: Serum progranulin may have potential to be used as a biomarker for the differentiation of EO-PE and LO-PE. The co-operative action between HIF-1 α and progranulin might play a key role in the pathogenesis of LO-PE. The predominant feature of LO-PE seems to be an inflammatory process, whereas in EO-PE placentation problem seems to be the main pathology