The full-term pregnancy developed severe supine hypotension resulting from inferior vena cava and abdominal aorta compression by the uterus, probable cause of both maternal and fetaldeath[6]. How to predict the incidence of supine hypotension syndrome (SHS), and to take appropriate prevention and intervention measures in advance was essential for maternal and fetal safety.
As reported in the literature[6, 7], weight can indirectly reflect the size of the uterus in pregnancy, and to estimate fetal weight through the ultrasonic measurement of fetal double top diameter can predict the size of the gravid uterus directly, both were the SHS risk factors. However ,there were more risk factors affecting the occurrence of SHS(eg, fetal position, inferior vena cava variation), predicting the occurrence of SHS based on risk factors was lack of feasibility in clinical work.
Brachial artery peak velocity can reflect changes in left ventricular stroke volume, can judge capacity reactivity effectively[3, 4].When maternal forced expiratory, intrathoracic pressure increased, leading to venous reflux and left heart filling reduction[8], with capacity insufficient, the increased intrathoracic pressure can cause an increased degree of declined left ventricular stroke volume[9]. With Maternal from supine to left side, the uterus to the inferior vena cava and abdominal aorta oppression mitigated, bringing blood from the lower limbs and abdominal cavity back to the systemic circulation, this effect was equivalent to fast infusion of liquid to the parturient, if the heart had a capacity of reactivity, left ventricular stroke volume would be increased accordingly. At the same time, with the increase of blood volume, could reduce the degree of left ventricular stroke volume decline caused by increased intrathoracic pressure when maternal forced expiratory. Therefore, this study calculated brachial artery peak velocity difference in the expiratory phase before and after the body positions, to reflect the uterus oppression of the abdominal aorta and inferior vena cava, thus to predict the degree of compression of the uterus on related blood vessels after spinal anesthesia, and to predict possible SHS. The study indicated ΔVpmin、ΔΔVp could effectively predict the SHS after spinal anesthesia.
The study developed SHS judgement criteria according to literature reports[1], and plotted the ROC curve of ΔSBP,ΔDBP, ΔMAP, ΔHR and ultrasound measurement indicators ΔVpmax, ΔVpmin, ΔΔVp before and after the body positions, evaluated appeal indicators to predict the accuracy of SHS after spinal anesthesia. The larger the AUC, the higher the diagnostic accuracy of the index. AUC greater than 0.7 indicated that the indicator had excellent diagnostic accuracy[10]. The results indicated that the variation of brachial artery peak velocity measured by ultrasonic measurement in different positions of parturient had better diagnostic accuracy than difference between Blood pressure and heart rate, among them, ΔVpmin ≥ 10.55 cm/s had a good predictive effect on SHS after spinal anesthesia, sensitivity 78.0%, specificity 88.4%.
Although the difference of brachial artery peak velocity measured by ultrasonicduring the Valsalva maneuver in different positions of parturient can effectively predict the occurrence of SHS, this method required early training of maternal Valsalva maneuver and spend some time, it was not applicable to patients with acute caesarean section. In the follow-up study, we would further adjust the research method and look for a more practical approach to clinical practice.