Possible Pre-E or PIH

[NickyVincent]

Hi girls,

So I am currently 34 weeks pregnant. On Tuesday at my routine antenatal appointment I had a high BP reading of 150/100. They admitted me for monitoring and took blood and urine. My bloods and urine were 'ok' as the OB put it.

They took my blood pressure 4 times. The first two were with a med size cuff and I was seated. Both of these showed a BP of 150/100. There was then a shift change and a different midwife took the next two. She took these with a large cuff, with me laying down and with a wedge under my right side. The cuff was elevated above my heart. 'oh perfect' she said and when I asked what it was she said 110/70. Now my BP has been 120/90 for weeks, never really budged from that figure (except for when I had the flu earlier on). With the large cuff I couldn't even feel any compression whatsoever and it literally took her 20 tries to get this cuff to inflate.

The OB is still worried I am developing pre-e and have ordered me in for twice weekly ctgs and BP monitoring. I have pain along my bra line in my stomach and back, headaches, disturbed vision.

Am I right in thinking the last two BPs may have been inaccurate? I have a BP monitor at home that hs just given me a reading of 135/94.

I need some advice for what to say to the midwives tomorrow when I am being monitored!

[meli554]

Do they know about your stomach pain, headaches, & visual disturbances? Did they have you do a 24 hour urine collection?

[NickyVincent]

Yes, they know about the pain and headaches, etc.

No 24 urine collection, I'm in Australia though and I'm nt sure how often they do that as I've never heard of it before.

[meghanjs]

I think that one of the biggest regrets I had during my PE (from 26 weeks, but not taken seriously until almost 36 weeks) is that I was not more forceful with my providers. My bps were 160s/90s-100s from 26 weeks with 533/24Hr urine and I allowed them to pooh-pooh me. It sounds like you have URQ pain, hypertension and visual changes and I don't think that you should wait until tomorrow to be seen. I think that you need to be seen today, now and demand an accurate assessment of your blood pressure, a 24 hour urine, liver function tests and monitoring of your child. Good luck.

And yes, you are right to think that those last bps were not accurate. Nothing makes a nurse happier than having normals (and I am a Nurse Practitioner, so i can say this). Having normals while doing it incorrectly is not a good thing. All blood pressures go down when laying on your left side, with a large cuff and having your arm above your heart.