INTRODUCTION
The recent studies showed that ischemia modified albumin (IMA) is a
biochemical marker that can make the early diagnosis of coronary artery
illness and cerebrovascular illness (1).
When tissue ischemia occurs, there can be changes in some albumin
molecules. Within a few minutes and a few hour duration, ischemia
decreases the dependency of albumin on substances like cobalt (2). The
discovery of this characteristic paved the way for the development of a
new test. Through this test, the amount of ischemia-modified albumin can
also be measured by measuring the amount of decrease in metal binding.
In acute ischemic cases, metal binding capacity in the N terminus region
of albumin and a new variant metabolic protein comes into existence.
Hypertensive disease of pregnancy is one of the most frequently seen
complications of pregnancy, being 5-10% and it is the most important
reason for maternal and perinatal morbidity and mortality (3).
Preeclampsia develops in an abnormal hypoxic intrauterine environment
characterized by reperfusion and oxidative stress. Several lines of
evidence suggest that IMA is elevated in pathologies, where hypoxia
and/or oxidative stress are found (4). To determine the prenatal hypoxic
brain injury resulting as a result of the preeclampsia, various
biochemical and biophysical tests were suggested, yet many of them
provided a limited number of benefits. The decrease of diastolic blood
flow in the umbilical artery and the decrease of resistance in cerebral
vessels could be an indicator of placental insufficiency in preeclampsia
cases (5).
The most common method used in the prediction of fetal wellbeing is a
non-stress test (NST). There are many studies in the literature
conducted to predict the fetal wellbeing of NST.
By looking at the post-natal normal and abnormal umbilical artery gas
values of the reactive NST patterns, the sensitivity, specificity,
positive and negative predictive values were found to be respectively
79%, 85%, 68%, 91%.6,7. The search for new tests continues to
increase these values. This study determines the use of IMA in
predicting the prenatal fetal asphyxia in normal and preeclamptic
pregnancies and to evaluate the correlations between IMA, NST and fetal
Doppler ultrasonography findings.