Progesterone therapy to decrease first-trimester spontaneous abortions in previous aborters.
A study was designed to see if the use of prophylactic progesterone vaginal suppositories (PVS) reduced the risk of spontaneous abortions in women with a history of at least one spontaneous abortion. PVS was employed during the luteal phase to the end of the first trimester. The dosage was initially 50 mg/day, but was increased according to the endometrial biopsy and doubled as soon as pregnancy was established. Only 10 women (10%) aborted, and 8 of these 10 were successful in their next PVS-treated pregnancies. Overall there were 12 losses in 132 pregnancies (9%) in these PVS-treated patients. Forty-two percent of untreated controls aborted (10/24). The results suggest that PVS is effective in reducing the risk of spontaneous abortions in high-risk patients.
D000026:Abortion, Habitual / Q000188:drug therapy*; D003340:Corpus Luteum Maintenance / Q000187:drug effects; D004717:Endometrium / Q000166:cytology; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D010570:Pessaries; D011247:Pregnancy; D011261:Pregnancy Trimester, First; D011374:Progesterone / Q000627:therapeutic use*
D011374:Progesterone