association of hereditary thrombophilia with intrauterine growth restriction

background: intrauterine growth retardation (iugr) contributes significantly to fetal morbidity and mortality, but its etiology is unknown in most cases. objective: the aim of this study was to examine the association between inherited thrombophilia and iugr. materials and methods: a case-control study was performed in a tertiary referral center (afzalipour hospital) over 2-years period (2010-2011). cases (n=25) were women who had pregnancies complicated by iudr and control subjects (n=25) were women who had normal growth fetuses. all women were tested for inherited thrombophilia at least 4 weeks after delivery. main outcome measure was prevalence of maternal thrombophlia. genotyping for factor v leiden, prothrombin gene (nucleotide g20210a), and mthfr (c677t) mutation was performed by pcr technique. protein c, s and antithrombin iii activity were determined with a clotting assay (sta-staclot, france). results: the prevalence of hereditary thrombophilia was 68% (n=17) in iugr group, and 32% (n=8) in control group (or: 1.5, p=0.011, 95% ci: 1.3-14.8). the frequency of mthfr (c677t) gene mutation (p=0.037; or: 3.69) and protein s deficiency (p=0.034; or: 5.41) was significantly increased in the group with iugr compared with the control group. there was no significant difference between the two groups in prothrombin g20210a mutation (p=0.490) and protein c deficiency (p=0.609). a significant difference in the frequency of multiple thrombophilias was detected between the two groups (p=0.009). conclusion: this study revealed that protein s deficiency and mthfr gene mutation are more prevalent in pregnancies with iugr.