Several major disorders that occur during pregnancy result from failure of the placenta to implant correctly into the uterus or womb.  During early pregnancy cells from the placenta, known as trophoblast cells, invade into the uterus and tap into the mother’s blood supply to sustain the growing baby. Failure of this process can lead to insufficient supply of blood to the placenta resulting in preeclampsia, as well as low birth weight babies, stillbirth or recurrent miscarriage.

The invading placental trophoblast cells intermingle with maternal immune cells in the uterine lining. Trophoblast express not only maternal but also paternal genes and these will be different or “foreign” to the mother. Maternal immune cells can recognize these “foreign” fetal molecules and are thought to regulate the implantation process, allowing sufficient but not excessive invasion of the placenta. In the preeclamptic pregnancy this interactive process goes wrong and there is ...

Last month, a team from the University of Alberta reported in the journal Hypertension on a method to determine that a woman is at high risk of developing preeclampsia.  While this method may or may not be developed into a screening test in the future, it confirmed that changes in the metabolism and the vasculature of women who go on to develop preeclampsia can be detected at 15 weeks gestation.
 
Two Preeclampsia Foundation members were involved in media coverage on the topic and we are very grateful to them for bringing a human face to the stories about preeclampsia. Because of the press conference and media efforts of the University, a lot of lay press picked up the story and we are fortunate that the Foundation was mentioned in several of those stories.  The research findings while seemingly exciting to a lay public are far from commercial realization and would need more validation for most governmental oversight bodies (e.g., FDA).  Our message of "cautious ...

Research into preeclampsia and its relationship to the long-term health of mother and baby reveals both good news and bad news for preeclampsia survivors.
 
Evidence is unequivocal now that women who have experienced preeclampsia, particularly severe or early onset preeclampsia, are at a significantly increased risk for cardiovascular problems later in life compared to women with a history of healthy pregnancies. The "take home lesson" for preeclampsia survivors is to establish a healthy lifestyle (weight loss, exercise, no smoking) and to discuss cardiovascular assessment and follow up with your health care provider.
 
"There are very few identified risk factors for later life heart disease in women; preeclampsia is one of the few warning signs we'll get and we should take advantage of it," explained Executive Director Eleni Tsigas.
 
One study demonstrated that women who have a history of preeclampsia experienced an increased risk of ...

Vitamin D and Microchimerisms:

Could the sun really have something to do with preeclampsia?
"Maternal vitamin D deficiency may be an independent risk factor for preeclampsia. Vitamin D supplementation in early pregnancy should be explored for preventing preeclampsia and promoting neonatal well-being," reads a paper published in the Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism in 2007. Although some of us who had our babies in, say, Portland, Oregon, where the sun rarely shines, would love to claim Vitamin D deficiency, other preeclampsia survivors sweltered under the Arizona or California sun. If you think this might be a possible therapy to explore, talk to your health care professional and check out the discussions in our Community Forum on this topic.
 
Micro-what?
Researchers have found that women with preeclampsia, which causes high blood pressure in ...

Say “matrix” and visions of a kick-boxing, black-clad Keanu Reeves may come to mind. No, this is not a movie review.

Every day, a small army of Harvard Medical School researchers reports to The Life Sci­ences Building in Boston’s Longwood Medi­cal Area. It’s new, ultra high-tech. It towers over its neighboring hospitals and research facilities and, with its clean lines, giant glass panels and sweeping marble stairway, would be a set designer’s dream for another sequel to “The Matrix”. The men and women who spend so much of their lives in this futuristic workplace are pulmonologists, oncologists, nephrologists, neurologists; they are natives of France, Norway, Sweden, Finland, India, China, Japan, Turkey, and the U.S. They study and work under the leadership of Dr. Raghu Kalluri, Chief of the Division of Matrix Biology at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center.

Composed of proteins and found through­out the body, the matrix serves as a platform for ...

Several years ago, Dr. Jun “Jim” Zhang, a senior investigator at the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development approached the Preeclampsia Foundation about working together on an epidemiological research study. Here was the study’s rationale:

“Preeclampsia is a syndrome of hypertension accompanied by proteinuria. It is a major pregnancy complication, associated with premature delivery, fetal growth restriction, abruptio placentae, and fetal death, as well as maternal morbidity and mortality.  Although preeclampsia has been recognized for centuries, the etiology of this disorder remains unknown. Familial clustering of preeclampsia has long been identified, leading to the concept of a genetic basis for this syndrome. We propose a familial genetic study of preeclampsia. As such a study is often difficult to do, we plan to conduct a pilot study to test the feasibility, logistics and examine frequency of genetic polymorphism of certain genes in the target ...