Stroke complicating pregnancy and the puerperium

Stroke complicating pregnancy and the puerperium in Taiwan and the comparison between Western and Eastern countries have not been well studied. We identified retrospectively 32 cases of stroke from 66 781 deliveries, including 21 intracranial hemorrhages and 11 cerebral infarctions from 1992 to 2004. The most common causes of intracranial hemorrhage were vascular anomaly (29%), pre-eclampsia/eclampsia (24%), undetermined (24%) and coagulopathy (19%). The most common causes of cerebral infarction were cardioembolism (36%), cerebral venous thrombosis (27%) and pre-eclampsia/eclampsia (18%). Perinatal adverse outcome included two stillbirths, nine premature deliveries and four abortions. The compiled results of previous studies and ours revealed that intracranial hemorrhage appeared to be slightly more common in Taiwan (43-69%) than in the Western countries (33-52%). The average maternal mortality rate was 17.8% (range 9-38) with 77.8% due to intracranial hemorrhage. The average incidence of stroke associated with pregnancy and the puerperium was 21.3 per 100 000 deliveries (range 8.9-67.1). Our study, different from the Western countries, showed that intracranial hemorrhage is slightly more common than cerebral infarction. Pre-eclampsia/eclampsia is an important cause of stroke, however, the possibility of cardioembolism in cerebral infarction and vascular anomaly in intracranial hemorrhage should be studied.