The effect of vaginal disinfection on reducing post-caesarean endometritis: A prospective, randomised controlled trial.

PURPOSE

We aimed to evaluate the efficacy of vaginal disinfection using 10 % povidone-iodine on rates of endometritis from post-caesarean infectious diseases before elective caesarean section (CS).

METHODS

A total of 270 pregnant women who chose to undergo elective CS were recruited for this prospective randomised controlled study. The experimental group comprised 130 patients who had preoperatively undergone vaginal disinfection with 10 % povidone-iodine for 30 s. The control group consisted of 140 patients who had not undergone any vaginal implication before CS. The primary outcome measure was the rate of postpartum endometritis for each group. Intraoperatively, all patients who had closed uterine cervical canals underwent a digital opening of the internal and external cervical canal to equalise the groups. All of the participants were checked for endometritis one week after CS at the hospital. Additionally, for the week before and after surgery, C-reactive protein (CRP) and white blood cell (WBC) values were assessed for both groups. Ethics committee approval number: 339. Statistical analysis was performed using R version 3.5.1 (R statistical Software, Institute for Statistics and Mathematics, Vienna, Austria).

RESULTS

The groups were balanced in terms of the patients' demographic characteristics. There were no significant differences between the two groups according to endometritis rates: 4.6 % in the study group versus 6.4 % in the control group (p > 0.05). The CRP and WBC values before CS were similar in both groups. In the study group, the CRPand WBC values after CS were lower, whereas they were higher in the control group after CS; these differences were significant (p = 0.01 for CRP and p = 0.001 for WBC).

CONCLUSION

Vaginal disinfection with povidone-iodine solution 10 % before elective CS does not significantly reduce post-caesarean endometritis rates; however, it does significantly reduce inflammatory markers such as CRP and WBC.