Uterine vascular abnormalities linked to pregnancy complications: color and power Doppler-assisted transvaginal ultrasound evaluation
| 14 mar 2024
Article Category: Research paper
Publicado en línea: 14 mar 2024
Páginas: -
Recibido: 29 may 2023
Aceptado: 28 jul 2023
DOI: https://doi.org/10.15557/jou.2024.0011
Palabras clave
© 2024 Ashraf Talaat Youssef, published by Sciendo
This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
Aim
Abnormal uterine vascular pattern can be observed during transvaginal ultrasound examination used for investigating post-abortion bleeding and secondary postpartum hemorrhage. The purpose of this series of cases was to evaluate almost all the rare causes of uterine vascular abnormalities linked to pregnancy complications, and determine how to arrive at the diagnosis to optimize patient management, which is crucial for preventing life-threatening massive vaginal bleeding.
Material and methods
Retrospective observational case series study including 20 women with postpartum or post-abortion vaginal bleeding who were found to have an abnormal uterine vascular pattern during a transvaginal color duplex assessment.
Results
The study yielded the following findings: 10 cases of enhanced myometrial vascularity, two cases of pseudoaneurysm in the uterine artery, one case of myometrial venous varix, one case of large uterine venous pseudoaneurysm, one case of uterine arteriovenous malformation, one case of retained placental polyp, one case of invasive vesicular mole, and three cases of subinvolution of the placental implantation site.
Conclusions
Transvaginal color duplex ultrasound plays a crucial role in detecting uterine vascular abnormalities as a cause of post-abortion or secondary postpartum hemorrhage and can help differentiate the pathologies responsible for the abnormal vascular pattern, which is highly recommended to optimize patient management.