PYELONEPHRITIS IN PREGNANCY

Abstract

Pyelonephritis in pregnancy presents for explanation the questions as to when the organism gained entrance into the urinary tract before or during pregnancy or after delivery; identification of the organism; its source; the pathway of transmission to the kidney; why and how a particular pathway presented itself; the reason for the clinical degree of the disease; treatment and prognosis with their rationale based on the answer to the foregoing questions; and, of still greater importance, the possible utilization of these answers in the prevention of the disease. Antepartum residual urine is rarely found in primiparas with normal nervous systems, excepting the occasional case of psychic retention or retention due to position in bed. In multiparas, an occasional small residual before delivery might be accounted for by a cystocele. The bladder in the pregnant woman is distinctive, the bladder wall being markedly resistant to the inflowing water whether or not an