Published Jul 25, 2006
orcagrrrl2003
55 Posts
Hi everyone. I was just wondering if anyone knows if there is a link between preeclampsia and hep c? Just curious.
KellNY, RN
710 Posts
I personally haven't heard of or noticed a link between the two.
However--Hepatitis (and other liver problems--fatty liver, etc) can cause an elevation in LFTs and can be mistaken for Pre Eclampsia.
I actually began suggesting Hep Antibodies as part of the lab work for women who come back with large amt's of protein in the urine.
We just had a 20 year old who was diagnosed with Pre Eclampsia due to her elevated ALT and AST and protein in the urine. BPs were generally fine. BUT--her dx was retracted and changed once it came back that she actually had a fatty liver (sono).
Another woman (immigrant) was thought to have PreEclampsia, but it turned out she had Hep A.
Good luck!
RNfromMS
29 Posts
We have an unusually high number of pre-eclamptic patients at our hospital (high risk) and very few of them have Hepatitis C.
SmilingBluEyes
20,964 Posts
I know of no direct correlation or link between Hep C and pre-eclampsia. If anyone does, I would be interested in reading the literature, if you can point me to it!
elkpark
14,633 Posts
There is a very interesting article on current research into preeclampsia in, of all places, this week's (7/24/06) issue of The New Yorker. The article's not available on-line, but TNY is widely available in libraries and on newsstands.