Prediction of Preeclampsia by Analysis of Cell-free Messenger RNA in Maternal Plasma

Abstract

Objective The purpose of this study was to predict the occurrence of preeclampsia in a series of patients at gestational week 15-20 weeks, with the use of a panel of messenger RNA markers. Study Design Data from 62 patients with preeclampsia who were asymptomatic at the time of blood testing and 310 control subjects were analyzed. Multivariable analysis was performed with discriminant analysis. Results Univariable analysis identified vascular endothelial growth factor receptor 1 as the marker with the highest detection rate; placenta-specific 1 with the lowest. Mean estimated score for preeclampsia was 9.4 for control subjects and 72.5 for subjects who experienced preeclampsia. A receiver operating characteristic curve that was obtained with the estimated score for preeclampsia as a test variable yielded a detection rate of 84% (95% CI, 71.8-91.5) at a 5% false-positive rate with an area under the curve of 0.927 ( P Conclusion A panel of messenger RNA is able to detect subjects who will experience preeclampsia.