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The patient was a 38-year-old Japanese woman who had been diagnosed with hereditary angioedema type I at 7 years of age based on her family history. She had undergone four pregnancies. She gave birth to a healthy baby girl after her first pregnancy and had reported few episodes of angioedema. However, she subsequently required abortions due to frequent angioedema episodes that occurred during her three subsequent pregnancies. Thus, our patient showed two clinical pregnancy courses. After treating her with C1-inhibitor concentrate, her symptoms of angioedema disappeared. The preventive use of C1 inhibitor concentrates should be considered in hereditary angioedema (HAE) patients with frequent angioedema attacks during pregnancy.

A 44-year-old Japanese woman was diagnosed with type 1 hereditary angioedema (HAE) at the age of 30. In March 2007, she began suffering from severe abdominal pain due to intestinal edema. After treatment with C1-INH concentrate, her symptoms disappeared. However, during the subsequent three years, the frequency of the attacks increased continuously, and C1-INH concentrate was necessary for treatment of every attack. The increase in the number of attacks might have been due to the frequent injection of C1-INH concentrate or the deterioration of her disease course. In a genetic investigation, the patient was found to have a novel mutation in the C1-INH gene.