Marked improvement in the success rate of medical management of early pregnancy failure following the implementation of a novel institutional protocol and treatment guidelines: a follow-up study.

Purpose: To analyze the success rate, time to passage of tissue and subjective patient experience of a newly implemented protocol for medical management of early pregnancy failure (EPF) over a 2-year period.
Methods: A retrospective chart review of all patients with early pregnancy failure primarily opting for medical management was performed. 200 mg mifepristone were administered orally, followed by a single vaginal dose of 800 mcg misoprostol after 36-48 h. We followed-up with our patients using a written questionnaire.
Results: 167 women were included in the present study. We observed an overall success rate of 92 %, defined as no need for surgical management after medication administration. We could not identify predictive values for success in a multivariate regression analysis. Most patients (84 %) passed tissue within 6 h after misoprostol administration. The protocol was well tolerated with a low incidence of side effects. Pain was managed well with sufficient analgesics. Responders to the questionnaire felt adequately informed prior to treatment and rated their overall experience as positive.
Conclusion: The adaption of the institutional medical protocol resulted in a marked improvement of success rate when compared to the previously used protocol (92 vs. 61 %). We credit this increase to the adjusted medication schema as well as to targeted physician education on the expected course and interpretation of outcome measures. Our results underscore that the medical management of EPF is a safe and effective alternative to surgical evacuation in the clinical setting.
Competing Interests: The authors declare that they have no conflicts of interest. Funding The study did not have external funding. Ethics/informed consent The study was approved by the Ethics Committee of the Medical University of Innsbruck. All individual participants included in the study gave their informed consent for the prospective portion of the study. All procedures performed in this study involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.