Correlation of Doppler and placental immunohistochemical features in normal and intrauterine growth-retarded fetuses

The aim of this study was to correlate and compare Doppler and anatomical placental findings obtained from 48 normal and 35 intrauterine growth-retarded (IUGR) fetuses. The IUGR group consisted of 19 fetuses from pregnancies complicated by pre-eclampsia and 16 from healthy mothers. Color Doppler evaluation of umbilical, spiral and uterine arteries was performed. Placental specimens from both normal and growth-retarded fetuses were obtained at the time of delivery. Placental specimens were evaluated using histochemical and immunohistochemical techniques. A progressive decrease in the pulsatility index was observed in umbilical, spiral and uterine arteries throughout pregnancy in the normal-growth fetuses. High umbilical artery pulsatility index values were obtained in 29 out of the 35 growth-retarded fetuses, six of them showing absent or reversed end-diastolic umbilical artery flow pattern. A total of 13 IUGR fetuses showed high resistance uterine artery flow velocity waveforms. Increased pulsatility index values were obtained from the spiral arteries of 16 growth-retarded fetuses. Abnormal histological and histochemical placental patterns were observed in all the growth-retarded fetuses with umbilical artery Doppler abnormalities. The presence of a peculiar dendritic cell subpopulation, strongly resembling the Langerhans cells, expressing the HLA-DR+/CD1+ phenotype, was detected in all growth-retarded fetuses, whether there was maternal pathology or not. Our data show uterine and spiral artery data as being ineffective in the monitoring of IUGR fetuses. The placental extracellular matrix seems to play an important role in the regulation of the umbilical circulation. The presence of CD1+ cells as a sign of a possible immunological mechanism in the pathogenesis of the intrauterine growth retardation is discussed