Stroke during pregnancy is rare, but after occurring, most patients develop serious neurological conditions. Hemorrhagic stroke, including intracerebral hemorrhage and subarachnoid hemorrhage, often requires emergency surgical intervention. In addition to significant maternal physiological changes, the potential for fetal harm should be considered during anesthetic management of these patients. Whether cesarean section or neurosurgical intervention should be prioritized or performed simultaneously in pregnant women with stroke is an important issue. Whether the patients receive general or spinal and epidural anesthesia is another clinically significant issue. Finally neurosurgeons, anesthesiologists, and obstetricians should cooperate to manage pregnant women with stroke.Key words: pregnant woman, cerebral stroke, anesthesia
Maternal Physiological Changes During PregnancyImportant physiological changes occur in pregnancy that could affect anesthetic management. Such physiological changes are mainly the result of hormonal and anatomical changes.
I. Hormonal changesVarious hormonal alterations occur to sustain the pregnancy. Human chorionic gonadotropin allows the corpus luteum, which produces progesterone and estrogen, to be maintained. Endorphins and aldosterone are also secreted as shown in Fig. 1. Both estrogen and progesterone are important pregnancy-sustaining hormones that lead to endometrial hyperplasia. These hormones lead to dilation of blood vessels, which may cause cerebral aneurysms to increase in size. 4) In addition, meningiomas and other neoplasms expressing estrogen and progesterone receptors experience faster growth during pregnancy. 17) Increased levels of progesterone along with an increased rate of carbon dioxide production during pregnancy are responsible for increases in ventilation. Oxygen consumption also increases by as much as 60% during pregnancy. 20) As a result, functional residual capacity decreases by as much as 20% by the end of the third trimester. 11) Progesterone sensitizes the respiratory center to carbon dioxide. PaCO 2 falls to approximately 30 mmHg by the 12 th week of gestation. In the central nervous system, increased concentrations of endorphins have been found during pregnancy in animal models. 6) Beta-endorphin was identified as an endogenous agonist for