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Sensitivity of uterine artery Doppler pulsatility index in screening for adverse pregnancy outcome in first and second trimesters

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Abstract

Purpose

In a poor resource country where screening for adverse pregnancy outcomes using maternal biomarkers seems unattainable, there is a need to search for credible alternatives. This study is, therefore, aimed at determining the sensitivity of uterine artery Doppler pulsatility index (UtAD-PI) in predicting pregnancy outcomes in the first and second trimesters and to establish any statistical difference in mean UtAD-PI in first and second trimesters screening of women with normal and abnormal pregnancy outcomes respectively.

Methods

This clinical-based, longitudinal, and unpaired cohort study involved 500 pregnant women, who were screened for adverse outcomes using UtAD-PI and delivered in the hospital. These were divided into two groups, each having a training set and a test set. The training set was used to generate the receiver operator characteristic curve and cut-off point while the test set was used to test for sensitivity and specificity of the Ut-ADI in each trimester.

Results

The sensitivity and specificity of UtAD-PI in first-trimester screening are 97% and 76.5% while second-trimester gave sensitivity and specificity of 57.5% and 63.3% respectively. The uterine artery Doppler pulsatility index shows statistically significant differences between normal pregnancy and pregnancy with adverse outcomes (p-value = 0.000).

Conclusion

The uterine artery Doppler pulsatility index is a good screening tool for adverse pregnancy outcomes. First-trimester screening of patients for adverse outcomes is more sensitive than the second-trimester screening using UtAD-PI. There is also a statistically significant difference between mean UtAD-PI between normal pregnancy and pregnancy with adverse pregnancy outcomes.

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Data availability

Data are available with the corresponding author and can be made available when needed.

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Funding

The authors declared that no funds, grants, or other support were received from any agency as regards this study.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Medical Radiography and Radiological Sciences, Faculty of Health Sciences and Technology, College of Medicine, University of Nigeria, Enugu Campus, Enugu, Nigeria

    Everistus O. Abonyi, Felicitas U. Idigo, Angel-Mary C. Anakwue & Julius Amechi Agbo

Authors
  1. Everistus O. Abonyi
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  2. Felicitas U. Idigo
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  3. Angel-Mary C. Anakwue
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  4. Julius Amechi Agbo
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Contributions

Each of us participated actively in the course of this study. EOA and FUI designed the study. EOA performed the ultrasound scanning. JAA drafted the manuscript while A.C. Anakwue revised the manuscript for intellectual content. ACA and EOA analyzed the data.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Julius Amechi Agbo.

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Competing interest

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Ethical approval

This study was performed in line with the principles of the Declaration of Helsinki. Approval was granted by the Ethics Committee of Enugu state ministry of Health on 11/10/2018 with the number MH/MSD/REC18/037.

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Written informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.

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Not applicable here as no participant personal information was published here.

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Abonyi, E.O., Idigo, F.U., Anakwue, AM.C. et al. Sensitivity of uterine artery Doppler pulsatility index in screening for adverse pregnancy outcome in first and second trimesters. J Ultrasound 26, 517–523 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40477-022-00766-0

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40477-022-00766-0

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