Placental maturity, hypertensive disorders of pregnancy and birth weight.

Objectives: To compare maturity of placentas from women with hypertensive disorders with those from normotensive pregnancies and to determine the relationship between placental maturity (PM) and the diagnosis of small-for-gestational-age (SGA) in the newborns.

Materials And Methods: We examined placental stained specimens from women with normotensive pregnancies (n = 100), diagnosis of gestational hypertension (n = 38), mild (n = 10), or severe preeclampsia (n = 34) in an optical microscope. Placental Maturity Index (PMI) was calculated as the number of vasculo-syncytial membranes (VSM) in 1 mm(2) divided by VSM thickness (µm).