A new device being trialled in South Australia to test for a common but potentially serious pregnancy condition could "save a lot of lives" in rural and remote areas, researchers claim.
At 37 weeks pregnant, Elle McQueen was diagnosed with a "terrifying" pregnancy condition she had never heard of, that saw her immediately hospitalised and induced.
The Adelaide mother had pre-eclampsia, which affects up to one in 10 pregnancies.
Despite having high blood pressure in the weeks leading up to her hospitalisation and displaying symptoms including light-headedness and light sensitivity, she said the condition initially went undiagnosed.
"I took my blood pressure again this time at the GP and she said it was skyrocketing so [she] sent me into the hospital," she said.
"I was admitted and induced that night."
Diagnosing pre-eclampsia requires a combination of blood and urine tests and blood pressure monitoring, which is often carried out during prenatal appointments.
But through a Hospital Research Foundation grant, researchers have been trialling a new finger-prick device in South Australia.
If successful, the device could diagnose pre-eclampsia within 30 minutes.
The University of South Australia's chief investigator Duy Phu Tran said that would revolutionise the diagnosis process, particularly for women in rural and remote areas where blood test results can take more than a day.
He said a cure for pre-eclampsia did not yet exist, but early detection was essential.
"The condition can accelerate very quickly in a couple of hours and if it's left untreated, it can create a disaster for both expectant mother and the infant," he said.
"Accurate testing and on-time testing would give the local doctor the best indication what to do next."
"[With this device] you just simply crack open the packaging, place a few blood droplets inside and it all happens automatically within half an hour," he said.
"I would envisage this device … it can start to save lives; I would say a lot of lives."
Dr Tran said he first started working on the project years ago with the goal of creating a device that would "have a major impact" on pregnant women in developing countries.
He said the device would be significantly cheaper than current diagnosis methods but still had "a lot of hoops to jump through", which would likely take several years before it could be approved for use.
Clinical trials of the device will begin at the Women's and Children's Hospital in Adelaide within the next few months, with testing being carried out on women suspected to have pre-eclampsia.
If those trials are successful, the Royal Flying Doctor Service is expected to trial the device.
Rural Doctors Association president, Dr Megan Belot, said it would be "beneficial" to have reliable, time-critical diagnosis tools in rural and remote Australia.
"For those that actually have the blood tests done in a hospital, the turnaround time can be quite good but [for] a lot of small, rural hospitals they actually have to send the blood tests away to the next biggest town or hospital to have those blood tests done," she said.
"It's always better to know the result sooner rather than later.
"In the more advanced stages where you're actually clinically suspicious of someone having pre-eclampsia, the blood tests can be quite critical in knowing whether to evacuate a patient out.
"To have something that could be point-of-care testing to help with this diagnosis would be extremely helpful."
Dr Belot said it was important pregnant women attend regular prenatal appointments and that maternity services were sustained in rural and remote areas so pre-eclampsia – and any other concerns – could be detected early.
She said while up to one in 10 women experienced pre-eclampsia, most cases were mild and did not lead to adverse outcomes.
Ten years on from Ms McQueen's pre-eclampsia diagnosis, the memory remains raw.
She was surprised it had taken another decade to develop and trial other testing methods.
"I'm relieved, better late than never," she said.
"The pregnancy was riddled with anxiety," she said.
"I was just completely consumed by it the whole time, so worried [about] what was going to happen and nobody could give me any answers.
"The birth was traumatic because I had to be induced and that took 40 hours and it ended in emergency caesarean because my body just wasn't ready yet.
"Being able to diagnose that and eradicate all that anxiety and all that stress that I experienced, other mothers can just find out that they have it and have a treatment plan."
