Original communication
Pregnancy complicated by subarachnoid hemorrhage

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Abstract

  • 1.

    1. Twenty-nine cases of subarachnoid hemorrhage complicating pregnancy are reviewed from the world's literature.

  • 2.

    2. Three new cases of SAH in pregnancy that occurred in the author's experience are presented.

  • 3.

    3. SAH is a rare and formidable complication of pregnancy. Injection of oxytocies might be precipitating factors in causing rupture of silent cerebral aneurysms of pregnant women. Oxytocies should be administered with extreme caution to those women who have complaints of recurrent headaches or migraine.

  • 4.

    4. Unconsciousness due to SAH is of grave prognostic import, since a very large percentage of these patients die.

  • 5.

    5. Cesarean section in a pregnant woman with SAH is to be performed only for obstetrical indications, as the absence of labor prior to an attack does not significantly reduce the mortality.

  • 6.

    6. Pregnancy does not alter the clinical picture of subarachnoid hemorrhage.

  • 7.

    7. It is ineumbent upon the physician to perform an adequate neurological examination and spinal tap on all unconscious pregnant women in order to make the correct diagnosis and institute proper treatment at the most feasible time. Failure to do so will result in overlooking the presence of a subarachnoid hemorrhage, which will be found more often than a review of the literature indicates.

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