Clinical differences between early-onset HELLP syndrome and early-onset preeclampsia during pregnancy and at least 6 months postpartum.

Abstract

We sought to evaluate whether clinical and laboratory variables differ between former patients who had HELLP syndrome and former patients who had preeclampsia (PE) without HELLP. We compared early-onset HELLP (n = 75) with early-onset PE (n = 40) with respect to clinical features during the hypertensive complication and to metabolic, hemodynamic, and hemostatic variables determined at least 6 months postpartum. HELLP differed from PE by a borderline higher frequency of eclampsia (13% vs 3%) during the complication, and by a lower prevalence of hypertension (19% vs 33%), proteinuria (2% vs 23%), thrombophilia (6% vs 27%), obesity (9% vs 33%), hypertriglyceridemia (1% vs 15%), hyperglycemia (0% vs 11%), and elevated levels of fasting homocysteine (6% vs 21%) at least 6 months postpartum. Women with HELLP had fewer signs of abnormalities consistent with the metabolic syndrome and a 4-fold lower prevalence of thrombophilia as compared with PE women without HELLP.