Objective: To evaluate the maternal and perinatal outcomes of labor induction in women at term with oligohydramnios.Methods: A retrospective cohort of women with a singleton pregnancy, who had oligohydramnios at or beyond term (37-42 weeks) and underwent induction of labor for oligohydramnios were studied. Antenatally diagnosed fetal anomalies and intrauterine fetal demise were excluded. The women were categorized into two groups: 1) women with isolated oligohydramnios (n = 166) and 2) women with oligohydramnios associated with other maternal or fetal complications (n = 43). Maternal and perinatal outcomes were collected from the records of all deliveries, data compiled, and appropriate statistical tests were applied.Results: The study included 209 women with mean gestational age of 38.76 ± 1.00 weeks and mean induction-delivery interval of 17.45 ± 8.70 hours (16.98 hours in group 1 versus 19.23 hours in group 2). Most (75%) women delivered vaginally. Only one of the neonates had an Apgar score of less than 7 at 5 min. Average neonatal ICU length of stay was 5.52 days (5.27 days in group 1 versus 6.17 days in group 2). Among all the maternal and neonatal outcomes studied, only the mean birth weights among the two groups was found to be statistically significant (p = 0.0017).Conclusions: Women with isolated oligohydramnios and their neonates were not found to suffer any additional harm due to labor induction at term than women who had oligohydramnios associated with other complications.
Keywords: Induction of labor; isolated oligohydramnios; maternal and neonatal complications; neonatal intensive care.