Severe coronavirus infection in pregnancy: challenging cases report

Abstract

There are few data on the impact of COVID-19 in pregnancy, however, analyzing these data is important to guide the clinical practice, covering the early prevention, detection, patients' isolation, epidemiological investigation, diagnosis and early treatment. This is a report of three cases of COVID-19 confirmed by real-time reverse transcription - polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) of nasopharyngeal secretions collected in swabs from pregnant women in the city of Vitoria, Espirito Santo State, Brazil. In the three cases, all the patients presented with fever, one had shortness of breath, one had diarrhea, two of them reported abdominal pain and two of them had cough. The three patients progressed with a severe clinical evolution of COVID-19. The permanence in the intensive care unit (ICU) was more than 10 days. Two of them recovered and one remained in the ICU with irreversible refractory shock, multiple organ failure and died. The mode of delivery was individualized and based on the obstetric indication and severity of the maternal infection, and the cesarean section was indicated in the two severe maternal COVID-19 cases that evolved favorably. These newborns were premature and tested negative for COVID-19 by RT-PCR.