Pregnant mother, baby survive swine flu in Delhi

New Delhi, Feb 17 (IANS) A 28-year old woman, suffering from swine flu, successfully gave birth in a Delhi hospital. The woman also overcame the life threatening viral disease, a statement said Tuesday.

According to health experts, pregnant women are more prone to swine flu which is much more life threatening to both mother and the foetus compared to any other individual. Only 10 percent of such cases can be controlled.

The patient was admitted to the department of chest medicine at Sir Ganga Ram Hospital Jan 25 when she was 29-week pregnant. When she was diagnosed, she had fever with cough and progressive breathlessness, which are the absolute symptoms of swine flu.

Her X-ray examination showed bilateral pneumonia and decreasing oxygen saturation level which required very high oxygen support. Tamiflu, a medicine to combat swine flu, was started. Her H1N1 RTPCR was positive.

Delhi has witnessed 1,608 swine flu cases till now with six deaths. Sir Ganga Ram Hospital witnessed the first death due to swine flu Dec 26, last year.

The situation of the patient needed to be handled carefully because she entered the third trimester of her pregnancy, said Arup Basu, chairperson, department of chest medicine, Sir Ganga Ram Hospital.

"The dilemma was how to save both the mother and her baby. The baby was premature for delivery but since oxygen level of mother was already at critical level, the baby inside the womb was oxygen-deprived. A delivery before 32 weeks would have resulted in higher risk to the baby's life," Basu said.

A team of doctors took a collective decision to deliver the baby as soon as possible but the problem was of the baby's underdeveloped lungs.

"To overcome this problem, steroids were given to enhance the child's underdeveloped lungs. Efforts finally paid off and a healthy 1,345 gram baby was born Jan 29," it said.

The next attempt was to save the mother who was already into adult respiratory distress syndrome.

"She was resuscitated with non-invasive ventilator and high oxygen. She also developed complications of secondary sepsis deep vein thrombosis which were tackled with antibiotics, blood thinners and other supportive therapy. Both mother and the baby are recovering well and would be discharged shortly," said Geeta Mediratta, senior consultant, department of obstetrics and gynaecology, Sir Ganga Ram Hospital.

She said pregnant women infected with H1N1 can rapidly develop blood pressure and pulse rate imbalance, which acutely affect lung function and facilitate the development of pneumonia, acute pulmonary oedema (flooding of lungs with water), and other respiratory illnesses.

Archana Dhawan Bajaj, obstetrician and gynaecologist, Delhi-based Nurture clinic, said: "The uterus grows during pregnancy, it compresses the diaphragm and the area where the lungs are, and there is less air movement in lungs, so any type of infection can get aggravated during pregnancy."

Basu said swine flu can be prevented, if pregnant women take the vaccine.