Severe pre-eclampsia: another great imitator.

Twenty-eight women with severe pre-eclampsia were misdiagnosed and initially thought to have disorders unrelated to pregnancy. Their chief complaints included failing vision, liver or gallbladder dysfunction, renal failure, hemorrhage, seizures, and heart failure. Laboratory studies usually demonstrated thrombocytopenia and high hematocrit values. The development of these symptoms appears to begin with failure of the primigravida to appropriately increase her blood volume commensurate with the increase in size of her uterus. Expanding the severly pre-eclamptic patient's blood volume with intravenous albumin appears to be an effective and appropriate therapy.