Infective Endocarditis during pregnancy.

Infective Endocarditis (IE) during pregnancy is a rare but grave condition. The diagnosis and management can be challenging, especially when the pregnant patient warrants a cardiac operation under cardiopulmonary bypass. The present article describes IE during pregnancy based on a series of published case reports in the literature. IE during pregnancy often causes embolic events and mycotic aneurysms. Two-thirds of IE in the pregnant patients requires timely or urgent cardiac surgery to alleviate patients' deterioration. At least a 3-week antibiotic therapy is mandatory before cardiac surgery aiming at improving the patients' conditions. During cardiac surgery, fetal heart rates may temporarily be slowed down but may gradually recover to normal after the operation. The fetal and maternal mortalities were 16.7% and 3.3%, respectively. The fetal deaths were apparently associated with a cardiac surgery during early pregnancy. Cardiopulmonary bypass, hypothermia and rewarming can adversely affect both the mother and the fetus by triggering placental deficits, fetal hypoxia and uterine contraction. Avoidance of cardiac operations before 24th gestation week and preferably deferred until after 28th gestation week have been a plausible argument as per the possible fetal deaths related to immaturity.