A 5-year review of obstetrics and gynaecology admission into the intensive care unit of a tertiary hospital in Northern Nigeria

Background: Obstetrics and gynaecology admissions into the intensive care units (ICUs) are quite rare. Careful evaluation and prompt intervention in these patients is required to have a good outcome. Aim: To determine the indications, incidence, interventions, outcome and causes of death in obstetrics and gynaecology patients admitted into our ICU. Methods: A retrospective descriptive study of obstetrics and gynaecology patients admitted into the ICU of Aminu Kano Teaching Hospital as conducted. Data from the patient case files and the ICU records were collected over a period of 5 years from January 2012 to December 2016 and were analysed using SPSS 18. Results: The incidence of obstetrics and gynaecology admission into the ICU was found to be 10% (65/650), out of which 84.6% (55/65) were due to obstetrics cases, while 15.4% (10/65) were due to gynaecology cases. The most common obstetrics indication was hypertensive disorders in pregnancy, mostly eclampsia (46.3%), while the most common gynaecology indication was post-operative complications (66.7%). The major interventions the patients received were blood transfusion (48.9%), mechanical ventilation (44.7%), antihypertensive therapy (42.6%), anticonvulsant therapy (34%) and oxygen therapy (40.4%). The overall mortality rate in this study was found to be 40.4%, out of which 84.2% were obstetrics cases and 15.8% were gynaecology cases. The most frequent cause of death was due to cardiac arrest (63.2%). Conclusion: Obstetrics and gynaecology admissions into the ICU were found to be very low, with eclampsia being the most common indication. All patients admitted had multidisciplinary management. An obstetrics and gynaecology ICU should be made available in proximity to the department.