Prevention of Preterm Labour: 2011 Update on Tocolysis

Table 1

Effects of currently used tocolytic drugs.

Drugs	Effects	Outcome	Side effects	Studies
β AdRA	Decrease cAMP	Delay D 2–7 days	Cardiovascular	RCT [5, 11, 12]
			Metabolic	Meta-analysis [2, 10]
NO donor	Increase cGMP	Delay D 2 days	Cardiovascular	Small series [2, 5]
MgSO4	Decrease IC Ca++	No tocolytic effect	Neurological	RCT, meta-analysis
			Metabolic	[2, 4–6, 13, 14]
			Perinatal mortality
		Fetal neuroprotection		RCT [15, 16]
PgSI	On gap junction	Delay D 2–7 days	Gastrointestinal	RCT, meta-analysis
	Decrease IC Ca++		Fetal kidney function	[2, 4–6, 17, 18, 26]
			Premature closure ductus arteriosus
Ox RA	Competition with receptor binding	Controversial efficiency	IUGR? Mortality?	Review [2]
			Few side effects	RCT, meta-analysis
				[4, 5, 9, 11, 12, 19, 27]
Ca++ CB	Decrease IC Ca++	Delay D 7 days	Cardiovascular	No placebo RCT
		Decreased neonatal morbidity		Comparative RCT
				[2, 4, 9, 20–22]
Progesterone	Reduction preterm delivery in high-risk patients			RCT [23, 25]
	Decrease IC Ca++		Sedative
	Decrease Pg synthesis		Liver cytolysis	[24, 26]