Aim: Cesarean delivery is one of the most common surgical procedures in obstetric practice and its incidence is rising
worldwide. In Egypt, the past decade has witnessed a sharp increase in the CS rate to reach about 52 %. Post cesarean section
(CS) infectious morbidity is a major health problem, which can lead to maternal health morbidities in addition to economic
burden. Endometritis, febrile morbidity and wound infection are considered of the most frequent complications of post
cesarean infections. Endometritis is the commonest complication as it accounts up to 27%, followed by clinically significant
fever, which was reported as 5–24%, while the incidence of wound infection is about 2–9%. This complication, up to 10 times
more frequent after a cesarean delivery than after vaginal delivery.
Materials and Methods: This study was conducted on 54 females undergoing elective cesarean section, admitted to El-
Shatby Maternity University Hospital. Patients were divided into two groups, each group contained 27 cases. The first
group received Preoperative vaginal cleaning with10% povidone iodine for 30 seconds. The second group did not receive
preoperative vaginal cleaning.
Results: The Comparison between the two studied groups regarding incidence of febrile morbidity, post- operative endometritis
and wound infection were statistically significant; P = (0.009), (0.024) and (0.018) respectively. Appling povidone iodine
reduced the rate from 37 % in the control group to 7.4 % in the treatment group, post- operative endometritis rate from 29.6
% in the control group to 3.7% in the treatment group and post-operative wound infection rate from 33.3 % in the control
group to 7.4 % in the treatment group.
Conclusion: This study has shown that vaginal cleaning with povidone iodine prior to cesarean section can prevent postoperative
febrile morbidity.