Abstract

Fifty-one women with singleton pregnancies whose urinary oestrogen excretion was above the 95th centile of the hospital's reference range on two or more occasions were reviewed. The women did not differ from the general population in race, parity, age, height or weight gain during pregnancy, but they were slightly heavier. Fetal and placental weights were greater than the corresponding values in the general population , as were the volumes of urine containing the oestrogen, but none of these differences was sufficient to account for oestrogen excretion above the 95th centile. Eleven patients had a glucose tolerance test, two of them had abnormal results and nine had normal results but heavy babies. Patterns of oestrogen excretion did not identify a high-risk population but the women with consistently high excretion gave birth to eight of the nine babies that weighed greater than or equal to 4 kg in this population. Twenty-two of the women had 23 subsequent pregnancies in which oestrogen excretion was measured: excretion was normal in 17, low in two and above the 95th centile in four.