Emerg Med Clin North Am 2019 May 8;37(2):351-363. Epub 2019 Mar 8.
Department of Critical Care Medicine, MedStar Washington Hospital Center, Georgetown University School of Medicine, 110 Irving Street Northwest, Suite 4B-42, Washington, DC 20010, USA. Electronic address:
Many health care providers lack familiarity with maternal physiologic changes and the distinctive underlying etiology of cardiac arrest in pregnancy. Knowledge of what changes are expected in pregnancy and an understanding of how to adapt clinical practice is essential for the care of the pregnant woman in the emergency department. Amniotic fluid embolism should be recognized as a rare cause of cardiac arrest in pregnancy, characterized by the triad of cardiovascular collapse, hypoxic respiratory failure, and coagulopathy. Read More