Prognosis in threatened abortion: a comparison between predictions made by sonar urinary hormone assays and clinical judgement.

One hundred patients admitted to hospital with a diagnosis of threatened abortion were assessed by means of sonar, urinary oestrogen, pregnanediol and human chorionic gonadotrophin (HCG) assays and clinical examination. Assay of oestrogen excretion was the most accurate (86-5 per cent) in predicting the ultimate outcome of pregnancy, but did not give as much information as sonar examination which gave an accurate prognosis in 84 per cent of cases and was much quicker to perform The reasons for the sonar failures are discussed. Assay of urinary pregnanediol excretion gave an accurate indication of outcome in 74 per cent of cases and 24-hour urinary HCG in 70 per cent although random urinary HCG estimations provided an accurate prediciton in only 54-5 per cent of cases. Clinical examination presented the usual difficulties in assessing uterine size and predicting abortion from the amount of bleeding and pain.