ABSTRACT
This chapter reviews the current information pertaining to regulation of blood flow through the nonpregnant and pregnant uterus. Using a thermal conductivity probe as an indirect method of qualitatively measuring uterine blood flow, H. J. Prill and F. Gotz demonstrated that blood flow increases progressively during the follicular phase and decreases in the luteal phase of the cycle. Furthermore, the administration of cycloheximide, a reversible inhibitor of protein synthesis, inhibits the E-induced uterine blood flow response as well as the phenomenon of uterine water imbibition. Exogenously administered E produces large increases in uterine blood flow during pregnancy, although the observed percentage increases from baseline are not as striking as in the nonpregnant state. An additional attractive hypothesis regarding increases in uterine blood flow during pregnancy involves the changes which occur in uterine catecholamine metabolism during the course of gestation.
