High incidence of preeclamptic toxemia in patients with polycystic ovarian disease.

The incidence of preeclamptic toxemia (PET) was investigated in 72 anovulatory, oligomenorrheic and previously nulliparous women who conceived after an induction of ovulation. One-thousand consecutive spontaneous pregnancies and 1,000 pregnancies of primiparae were used as control groups. The anovulatory group consisted of 33 consecutive well-documented cases of polycystic ovarian disease (PCO) and 39 anovulatory patients in whom PCO was excluded (A-NPCO). The results indicate that pregnancies after induction of ovulation are accompanied with a higher incidence of PET. The rate of this disorder was significantly higher in PCO groups than in A-NPCO women (28.5 vs. 4%), when calculated per number of all pregnancies. The difference between the incidence of PET in PCO, A-NPCO, control primiparae and normal control patients was even more pronounced when calculated on the basis of the number of patients (54.5, 12.5, 11 and 2.5%, respectively). Overproduction of steroid hormones, especially androgens, was suggested as the main factor for the appearance of PET in PCO patients.