Archive for January, 2010
A lucky minority – 42% of women – don’t have to deal with morning sickness. The rest of us search – often fruitlessly – for ways to control our nausea and limit trips to the bathroom or nearest trash can.
According to a Wiser Pregnancy survey, 40% of women seek a doctor’s advice for morning sickness remedies, yet the advice isn’t always helpful.
Which begs the question: What do pregnant doctors do for their own morning sickness?
About 35% of doctor-moms (pregnant OB/GYNs, internists and general practitioners) report having “significant nausea” during pregnancy. Interestingly, these women’s approach to treating morning sickness differs quite a bit from their patients’.
One of the most noteworthy differences is that pregnant doctors are more likely to take prescription medication to alleviate nausea – 49% use it, compared to 20% of other women.
Also, a higher percentage of doctor-moms try common morning sickness remedies than other moms-to-be.
Take a look: Read the rest of this entry »
Wondering whether to paint that nursery pink or blue? You may not have to wait so long to find out, thanks to a maternal blood test.
A recent Norwegian study published in the journal Obstetrics & Gynecology found that a special maternal blood test was 100% accurate in determining a baby’s sex in 200 different pregnancies.
Most parents who want to know the baby’s sex have to wait until the second trimester, when an ultrasound exam can tell if you’re carrying a boy or a girl.
According to a WiserPregnancy survey, 81% of women have an ultrasound. Although ultrasound exams are often part of routine prenatal care, 51% of these women have an exam specifically to learn the baby’s sex.
However, the blood test in the Norwegian study could be particularly valuable for parents who have a family history of a sex-linked genetic disorder, such as hemophilia or Duchenne muscular dystrophy. Being able to learn the baby’s gender sooner could help parents and doctors make important decisions about managing the pregnancy.
If this test becomes publicly available, it could offer an alternative to riskier prenatal tests such as amniocentesis or chorionic villus sampling (CVS) in evaluating the risk of a genetic birth defect.
Do you plan on learning the baby’s sex before delivery? Why or why not?
That scourge of new moms – bisphenol A (BPA) – is going further under the microscope.
The health effects of bisphenol A – long used to harden plastics and found in everything from baby bottles to food and beverage containers – will be the focus of new research, say U.S. health officials. Although the full effects of the chemical are not known, BPA exposure has been linked to several health problems, such as heart disease, diabetes or liver-enzyme abnormalities.
Most worrisome to new mothers is that BPA is in many baby products: bottles, sippy cups, liners of liquid baby formula containers.
But many moms-to-be are taking preventive steps early to be toxin-free. According to a WiserPregnancy survey, 26% of women focus on having an eco-friendly or “green” pregnancy, meaning that they try to avoid known or potential toxins that could harm their baby. Read the rest of this entry »
Earlier this year, a judge ordered a pregnant Florida woman to stay in bed after her doctor advised she go on bed rest. The woman, Samantha Burton, questioned her doctor’s recommendation. Although she was at risk for a miscarriage at week 25 of her pregnancy, she wondered if bed rest for up to 15 weeks was necessary. And as a working mother of two toddlers, she didn’t think it was feasible.
Before Burton could seek a second medical opinion, a circuit court judge ordered that Burton stay confined to her hospital bed and to undergo “any and all medical treatments” her doctor deemed necessary for the fetus. Unfortunately, after three days in the hospital, Burton underwent an emergency C-section and the baby was found dead.
The case continues in district court to determine if the lower court overstepped its boundaries. Can a court intervene in a pregnant woman’s care of her fetus?
Burton’s predicament isn’t so unusual. According to a Wiser Pregnancy survey, just over 11% of pregnant women have been put on bed rest. Although medical professionals debate the effectiveness of bed rest at preventing preterm delivery or miscarriage, women with certain conditions – high blood pressure, cervical insufficiency, pregnancy with multiples – may very well end up spending several weeks on bed rest.
Doctors may recommend bed rest even for conditions that aren’t severe. Of women put on bed rest:
- 21.8% report that their condition was not severe
- 37.6% report that their condition was somewhat severe
- 20.0% report that their condition was severe
- 20.6% report that their condition was very severe
Obviously, bed rest can take a substantial toll on career, parenting and other responsibilities. Yet regardless of the severity of the condition, many women will go on bed rest if their doctor advises it.
Do you think Burton was justified in her objection, or was the judge right to step in to protect the fetus’s best interest? And if your doctor orders bed rest, how will you respond?
Our site is getting bigger and better! Thanks to your feedback, we’re making WiserPregnancy even more useful. New content, data and features are coming your way, plus some parts have been redesigned.
Stand-out additions include:
- Doctor data – Ever wonder what your doctor did in her pregnancy? Now you can find out. More than 225 doctors – who are also moms – took our pregnancy survey. About 50% of the docs are OB/GYNs; the other half are internal medicine and general practitioner doctors. Get access to these doctor-moms’ decisions about their pregnancies, and compare them to your own decisions.
- More peer data – WiserPregnancy currently has data from more than 530 women. In the last few weeks, an additional 1,510 expectant or new moms completed the survey. That’s even more relevant information about the important decisions they made in their pregnancies.
- More info about pregnancy topics – We currently cover just over 40 pregnancy-related health issues. You wanted more? You got it! We’ve gathered data and research on an additional 26 pregnancy topics. Coming in February, you’ll have access to data, descriptions and questions to ask your doctor about nearly 70 different pregnancy issues. New topics include: bed rest, diet, financial planning during pregnancy, eco-friendly pregnancy, parenting while pregnant, miscarriage and multiples, among others.
- New and improved community – Connect with others on our forums, in our blogs and on our Twitter page.
- Customized newsletters – Each week you can get an email newsletter that tracks your pregnancy and shares some of the health issues you may be experiencing that week. Just sign up – it’s free!
Do you have any other suggestions for us? What do you think about the improvements?
Ever wonder why your healthcare provider checks your blood pressure at every routine prenatal checkup?
Blood pressure checks can diagnose gestational hypertension, a serious condition that affects about 6% of pregnant women, according to a WiserPregnancy survey. Gestational hypertension develops in or after the 20th week of pregnancy and goes away after delivery.
Unmanaged high blood pressure can lead to a host of complications:
- Less blood flow to the placenta, which reduces the fetus’s nutrient and oxygen supply
- Placental abruption, when the placenta separates from the uterus too early
- Preeclampsia, a potentially deadly condition
- High blood pressure and preeclampsia in future pregnancies
- Induced premature delivery to protect the mother or fetus from life-threatening complications
- Future cardiovascular problems, even if high blood pressure goes away after delivery
And since women with high blood pressure usually don’t experience symptoms, routine checks are important. If you’ve been diagnosed with high blood pressure, your doctor can tell if it has improved or worsened. If your BP is the same as before or worse, your doctor may suggest treatment.
Read the rest of this entry »
Sometimes it feels like the baby is never going to come out. If so, you may be thinking about inducing labor, just to hurry it along. It’s a popular choice: In 2007, for the 11th consecutive year, the number of C-sections in the U.S. rose, reaching 31.8% for all live births, according to the CDC/National Center For Health Statistics.
However, you may want to reconsider, suggests a new study from the University of Rochester School of Medicine.
The study found that inducing labor increases the risk that a woman will have a Cesarean delivery, one that she may not have needed if she’d waited to go into labor naturally. The study found that 1 to 2 out of every 25 induced labors resulted in a C-section.
Why is this a concern? Because C-sections, as common as they are, are still surgical procedures. As such, they are associated with several risks, including infection, maternal bleeding, blood clots and injury to mother or baby. Of course, C-sections are medically necessary in some circumstances: You have diabetes, high blood pressure and placenta problems; your baby is not growing well; or you’re 10 days past your due date.
However, if those don’t apply to you, the risks linked to being induced and having an unplanned C-section could outweigh the benefits.
Fortunately, maternal health problems that may require earlier delivery are not common, according to a recent WiserPregnancy survey:
In many of these cases, doctors decided early delivery was necessary.
If your condition doesn’t warrant early delivery, why is it better to wait for spontaneous (i.e., natural) labor? Besides giving your baby more time to develop, women who are not induced avoid the risk that they will need an otherwise unnecessary C-section.
Have you considered setting a date to be induced? Why or why not?
For many moms-to-be, taking medication is up there with smoking, alcohol and caffeine – completely out of the question. If there’s a risk – even a very slight one – that that baby could be harmed, these substances are usually considered off-limits until after delivery.
But what if your health – and your baby’s well-being – depends on you controlling symptoms that could develop into a life-threatening situation? Would you take prescription medication?
As it turns out, approximately two-thirds of women take prescription medication during pregnancy. WiserPregnancy data shows prescription medication is often used for these conditions:
There are a few widespread, reliable studies that fully investigate the effects of medication and mothers and babies. However, the effects of many drugs have yet to be studied, in part due to ethical concerns or the lack of large sample sizes tracked over time.
This has not gone unnoticed by the Food and Drug Administration. The FDA has proposed to study the safety of medications taken during pregnancy. The results will help physicians and patients make better decisions. They could also pave the way for future regulations and medical procedure guidelines.
Did you take prescription medication during pregnancy? Why or why not?
The material on this site is for informational purposes only and is not a substitute for medical advice, diagnosis or treatment provided by a qualified health care provider.
A lucky minority – 42% of women – don’t have to deal with morning sickness. The rest of us search – often fruitlessly – for ways to control our nausea and limit trips to the bathroom or nearest trash can. 
