A prospective study of maternal serum C-reactive protein concentrations and risk of preeclampsia

We measured C-reactive protein (CRP), a clinical marker of systemic inflammation, in maternal serum collected at 13 weeks gestation on average, to determine whether elevations precede the clinical manifestation of preeclampsia. Using a prospective, nested, case-control study design we measured CRP concentrations using a competitive immunoassay in 60 women who developed preeclampsia and in 506 women who remained normotensive throughout pregnancy. Logistic regression procedures were used to calculate odds ratio (OR) and 95% CI. Because maternal serum CRP is highly correlated with maternal prepregnancy body mass index (BMI), all analyses were repeated after stratification by maternal prepregnancy overweight status (BMI