Post‐cesarean section morbidity in HIV‐positive women

Abstract

The present work is an audit of post-cesarean section morbidity in HIV-positive women in the tertiary teaching hospital La Fé, Valencia, Spain. Retrospective case-control study. Forty-five HIV-positive pregnant women and 90 appropriately matched controls, delivered by cesarean section in the same hospital and managed using a uniform protocol. The duration of stay in hospital after cesarean section, the need for postoperative antibiotics and the incidence of major and minor puerperal complications. Baseline characteristics of HIV-positive women were also analyzed in relation to the morbidity after surgery. Chi-square analysis for categorical data and parametric and non-parametric tests for numerical data, where appropriate. Most HIV-positive women (86.7%) had a complicated recovery after surgery. A longer duration of stay in hospital (p<0.0005) and a greater incidence of major (p<0.003) and minor (p<0.00001) postoperative complications were observed in the HIV-positive group compared to the control group. HIV-positive women with > or =500 CD4 lymphocytes/mm3 had less post-cesarean section morbidity A greater post-cesarean section morbidity was found in HIV-positive women compared to the control women. Immunological status of HIV-positive women may be important in predicting puerperal morbidity after surgery.