Neonatal blood pressure in relation to pregnancy-induced hypertension in mothers

Changes in arterial systolic and diastolic blood pressure were investigated, using continuous non-invasive monitoring of the blood pressure in the first day of life, in order to determine whether differences exist between the newborn infants born to pre-eclamptic mothers and those born to healthy mothers. The pre-eclamptic group consisted of 40 newborns (19 prematures and 21 full-term) and the control group of 49 newborns (19 prematures and 30 full-term). In both groups the non-invasive oscillometric monitoring of arterial blood pressure was carried out every hour during the first day of life. It was found that full-term newborn infants born to pre-eclamptic mothers have significantly higher systolic blood pressure (78.67 +/- 10.9 mmHg) and diastolic blood pressure (44.4 +/- 10.2 mmHg) than full-term newborns (74.4 +/- 11.7 mmHg and 41.2 +/- 9.2 mmHg, respectively) born to healthy mothers. Preterm newborn infants born to pre-eclamptic mothers were also found to have significantly higher diastolic blood pressure (43.04 +/- 9.2 mmHg) than newborns (39.3 +/- 8.8 mmHg) of healthy mothers. We conclude that newborns of pre-eclamptic mothers should be monitored and considered as a group of high risk for hypertension.