Prognosis of pregnancy after threatened abortion.

Uterine bleeding in early pregnancy represents a definite threat to the developing embryo and constitutes a source of anxiety to both the patient and her clinician. In a prospective study of women with threatened abortion (TA) in the first and second trimesters of pregnancy in Ibadan, Nigeria, 48.8% of them aborted their pregnancies and there was no significant association between the various sociomedical factors considered and the outcome of pregnancy after TA. In like manner, routine admission of patients with TA into the hospital may not be essential for the preservation of the pregnancy. However, uterine bleeding as a symptom of abortion appears to be of greater risk if this occurs in the second trimester of pregnancy, and the predictive value of circulating progesterone levels in TA is significant. It is probable that uterine bleeding in the second trimester, especially when this is associated with low circulating levels of progesterone, may be pathognomonic of imminent abortion.