Benign intracranial hypertension and anesthesia for cesarean section

Benign intracranial hypertension (BIH) is defined as a syndrome of elevated intracranial pressure without clinical, laboratory, or radiologic evidence of a focal lesion or hydrocephalus. The four criteria of BIH are as follows: elevated intracranial pressure, i.e., cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) pressure above 200 mmH₂O; normal CSF composition; no alteration in the state of consciousness; and absent focal intracranial lesions. The anesthetic management of the obstetric patient with BIH rarely has been described. However, the details of anesthesia were lacking. For this reason and because of the paucity of reports of anesthesia in BIH, we report these two cases.