A clinical test useful for predicting the development of acute hypertension in pregnancy

Abstract

Ninety-three per cent of nulliparous, normotensive young women who subsequently developed pregnancy-induced hypertension demonstrated an increase in diastolic blood pressure of at least 20 mm. Hg when turned from the lateral recumbent to the supine position between the twenty-eighth and thirty-second weeks of gestation. Conversely, 91 per cent of women who did not demonstrate such a rise in diastolic blood pressure when turned to the supine position did not become hypertensive during that pregnancy. Additionally, very close correlations were demonstrated between: (1) a positive supine pressor response and increased sensitivity to intravenously infused angiotensin II, and (2) a negative supine pressor response and increased resistance to angiotensin II.