Mayo Clinic Laboratories releases new, first-to-U.S.-market pregnancy risk assessment

Preeclampsia is a pregnancy complication that affects approximately 5% of women worldwide. Clinically, preeclampsia can vary from mild to severe forms and may lead to premature delivery or other serious outcomes, which makes early detection and intervention critical to successful treatment.

Mayo Clinic Laboratories now offers the first preeclampsia-specific test (Mayo ID: PERA) that can be used to stratify patients into low or high-risk categories, indicating whether a patient is at risk for developing preeclampsia with severe features. With this information, clinicians can make more informed decisions about hospitalization, monitoring, more frequent checkups, and even early delivery.

The new assay measures the ratio of two proteins associated with preeclampsia and is recommended for women with singleton pregnancies who have been hospitalized for high blood pressure. The results stratify women at low and high risk for developing severe preeclampsia within two weeks. “The assay has 94% sensitivity and 75% specificity for the development of preeclampsia with severe features,” says Mayo Clinic Laboratories’ Joshua Bornhorst, Ph.D. “It can be used to reduce indications for hospitalization when there is a low risk for this progression.”

Key testing

• PERA | Preeclampsia sFlt-1/PIGF (Soluble fms-Like Tyrosine Kinase 1/ Placental Growth Factor) Ratio, Serum
  • Aids in risk assessment of patients with clinical signs and symptoms consistent with preeclampsia for the development of preeclampsia with severe features.
  • Indicated for use in pregnant women, with singleton pregnancies (gestational age 23 to 34+6/7 weeks) hospitalized for hypertensive disorders of pregnancy (preeclampsia, chronic hypertension with or without superimposed preeclampsia, or gestational hypertension) within two weeks of presentation.

For more information about Mayo Clinic Laboratories’ preeclampsia serum test, visit the test’s landing page on MayoClinicLabs.com. You can also listen to Dr. Bornhorst discuss the test and its benefits to patient care in more detail in this test-specific episode of Mayo Clinic Laboratories’ “Answers From the Lab” podcast.