# Oral contraceptives, pregnancy and abortion (may be TMI) **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [November 17, 2004, 12:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oral-contraceptives-pregnancy-and-abortion-may-be-tmi/275154 "2004-11-17T00:10:02Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Alias](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/a88e4f/32.png) [@Alias](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alias)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2004, 12:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oral-contraceptives-pregnancy-and-abortion-may-be-tmi/275154/1 "2004-11-17T00:10:02Z")
A friend of mine recently became violently ill. She would feel hungry, eat, then become horribly sick with excessive vomiting and diarrhea. She would feel ok for a few days, then get really sick all over again. She confided in me at that time that she’d had her period for almost a month straight. At my nagging and urging, she finally, went to a doctor, and he diagnosed her as having a very serious infection in her uterus and fallopian tubes. He also told her that she was 3 months pregnant with a very damaged fetus. She freaked and told him that she’d been taking her birth control pills for the last three months, because she’d had no idea she was pregnant. My question is, what the heck happened? Did the birth control pills damage the fetus, or was it the infection. Did the pills cause the infection, or was the pregnancy bad from the beginning? I asked her, and she said that she didn’t understand everything they told her. ---
**Author:** ![Hadrian0117](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Hadrian0117](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hadrian0117)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2004, 12:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oral-contraceptives-pregnancy-and-abortion-may-be-tmi/275154/2 "2004-11-17T00:12:26Z")
Did she take antibiotics? If she did that would make the birth control pills not work. ---
**Author:** ![Alias](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/a88e4f/32.png) [@Alias](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alias)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2004, 12:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oral-contraceptives-pregnancy-and-abortion-may-be-tmi/275154/3 "2004-11-17T00:12:36Z")
> [@Alias](#): > > A friend of mine recently became violently ill. She would feel hungry, eat, then become horribly sick with excessive vomiting and diarrhea. She would feel ok for a few days, then get really sick all over again. She confided in me at that time that she’d had her period for almost a month straight. At my nagging and urging, she finally, went to a doctor, and he diagnosed her as having a very serious infection in her uterus and fallopian tubes. He also told her that she was 3 months pregnant with a very damaged fetus. She freaked and told him that she’d been taking her birth control pills for the last three months, because she’d had no idea she was pregnant. > > My question is, what the heck happened? Did the birth control pills damage the fetus, or was it the infection. Did the pills cause the infection, or was the pregnancy bad from the beginning? I asked her, and she said that she didn’t understand everything they told her. I guess I never said where “abortion” fit in from my thread description. My friend was advised by her doctor to have an abortion because of the extensive damage to the fetus. ---
**Author:** ![Alias](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/a88e4f/32.png) [@Alias](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alias)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2004, 12:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oral-contraceptives-pregnancy-and-abortion-may-be-tmi/275154/4 "2004-11-17T00:15:46Z")
> [@Hadrian0117](#): > > Did she take antibiotics? If she did that would make the birth control pills not work. I don’t know about that, but she did say that she may have missed a dose or taken one late. ---
**Author:** ![inkleberry](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/f17d59/32.png) [@inkleberry](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/inkleberry)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2004, 12:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oral-contraceptives-pregnancy-and-abortion-may-be-tmi/275154/5 "2004-11-17T00:16:38Z")
1- SHE SHOULD CALL HER DOCTOR FOR AN EXPLANATION. I cannot stress that enough. This could be something that might reoccur or get worse if she doesn’t understand how to take care of herself. 2- The infection likely caused the damage. Birth control pills can cause androgen insensitivity (a boy with small or underdeveloped genitals), but likely won’t do much else. 3- Sounds like Pelvic Inflammatory Disease, which is usually sexually transmitted. This is why calling the doctor is so important- she could get it again from her partner or put herself at further risk. PID does all the things you describe. The fetus wouldn’t cause PID, but the sperm that put the fetus there in the first place might have. 4- She should calling her doctor already and have them explain things. Like when she can start taking the pill again. Or maybe she needs a different kind, because it doesn’t sound like it did its job. And she may need special surgery or follow-up care to remove the fetus. ---
**Author:** ![Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/qadgop_the_mercotan/32/83_2.png) [@Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qadgop_the_Mercotan)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2004, 12:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oral-contraceptives-pregnancy-and-abortion-may-be-tmi/275154/6 "2004-11-17T00:51:18Z")
> [@Hadrian0117](#): > > Did she take antibiotics? If she did that would make the birth control pills not work. Untrue! Except for one uncommonly prescribed antibiotic, rifampin, this old assumption has **not** been demonstrated in scientific studies. > [@](#): > > Early data about 20 years ago seemed to indicate that when antibiotics were taken along with birth control pills, more women got pregnant than you would normally expect. Drugs like ampicillin and tetracycline were suspected to interfere with OCPs. However, all of the recent studies that have looked at this, have shown that antibiotics do not increase the pregnancy rate at all and they point out that the old data was not reliable enough to draw conclusions about pregnancy rates on any of the antibiotics. [http://www.wdxcyber.com/ncontr10.htm](http://www.wdxcyber.com/ncontr10.htm) QtM, MD ---
**Author:** ![Malodorous](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e47774/32.png) [@Malodorous](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malodorous)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2004, 1:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oral-contraceptives-pregnancy-and-abortion-may-be-tmi/275154/7 "2004-11-17T01:04:37Z")
A friend of mine was on birth control pills, unaware that she was pregnant, and they caused her to miscarry. She had some other health problems, however, and so was not on the standard birth control pills but some alternative, so **inkleberry’s** statement that birthcontrol will not usually damage a fetus might be correct in normal cases. ---
**Author:** ![inkleberry](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/f17d59/32.png) [@inkleberry](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/inkleberry)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2004, 1:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oral-contraceptives-pregnancy-and-abortion-may-be-tmi/275154/8 "2004-11-17T01:17:31Z")
> [@Malodorous](#): > > A friend of mine was on birth control pills, unaware that she was pregnant, and they caused her to miscarry. She had some other health problems, however, and so was not on the standard birth control pills but some alternative, so **inkleberry’s** statement that birthcontrol will not usually damage a fetus might be correct in normal cases. Planned Parenthood’s site states: “It is unlikely that taking the pill during early pregnancy will increase the risk of defects in the fetus. However, the likelihood of tubal pregnancy is greater if you become pregnant while taking the progestin-only pill.” Searching Google reveals many other reputable sites also saying the same thing. Unfortunately, we can only speculate about a lot of things here because the girl didn’t understand her doctor. Again, she should really call them. Or call Planned Parenthood. Or an urgent care clinic. Or some type of medical professional. ---
**Author:** ![AngelicGemma](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/439d5e/32.png) [@AngelicGemma](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AngelicGemma)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2004, 12:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oral-contraceptives-pregnancy-and-abortion-may-be-tmi/275154/9 "2004-11-17T12:47:33Z")
> [@Malodorous](#): > > A friend of mine was on birth control pills, unaware that she was pregnant, and they caused her to miscarry. She had some other health problems, however, and so was not on the standard birth control pills but some alternative, so **inkleberry’s** statement that birthcontrol will not usually damage a fetus might be correct in normal cases. I t depends on the type of birth control pill. On the ones I take, if I accidently became pregnant there would be no harm to the baby. ---
**Author:** ![Alias](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/a88e4f/32.png) [@Alias](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alias)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2004, 12:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oral-contraceptives-pregnancy-and-abortion-may-be-tmi/275154/10 "2004-11-17T12:51:56Z")
She did have a procedure performed to remove the infected tissue and the fetus. She was also put on heavy-duty antibiotics for any remaining infection, so that part is pretty much taken care of. As far as PID, I’m not sure she’s been informed of that possibility. I’ll speak to her about it this week. Thanks for the prompt answers. ---
**Author:** ![Dr\_Paprika](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr_paprika/32/3042_2.png) [@Dr\_Paprika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr_Paprika)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2004, 5:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oral-contraceptives-pregnancy-and-abortion-may-be-tmi/275154/11 "2004-11-18T05:12:33Z")
Birth control pills aren’t foolproof. Heck, I’ve seen maybe six people get pregnant after tubal ligations. Lots of folks get pregnant on the pill (which is 99% or so effective). Back-up contraception has its place if you need more assurance. Some of these folks were probably taking antibiotics too, but you don’t need to be taking amoxicillin to get pregnant on the pill, especially the lower dose ones with fewer side effects. ---
**Author:** ![Figimingle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e47774/32.png) [@Figimingle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Figimingle)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2004, 4:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oral-contraceptives-pregnancy-and-abortion-may-be-tmi/275154/12 "2004-11-29T16:28:10Z")
> [@Qadgop the Mercotan](#): > > Untrue! > > Except for one uncommonly prescribed antibiotic, rifampin, this old assumption has **not** been demonstrated in scientific studies. > > [http://www.wdxcyber.com/ncontr10.htm](http://www.wdxcyber.com/ncontr10.htm) > > QtM, MD [sorry for the slight hijack, but this really confused me] But what about antibiotics interfering with the absorption of the hormones in the BCPs? All the BCP patient information packets warn of taking them with antibiotics and it’s definitely possible to have early bleeding and other interruptions when taking them together. I’m a PhD, not an MD, but I’m speaking from personal experience with Ortho-tricyclin and other pills. ---
**Author:** ![LorieSmurf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/a587f6/32.png) [@LorieSmurf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LorieSmurf)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2004, 1:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oral-contraceptives-pregnancy-and-abortion-may-be-tmi/275154/13 "2004-11-30T01:39:48Z")
> [@Alias](#): > > She did have a procedure performed to remove the infected tissue and the fetus. She was also put on heavy-duty antibiotics for any remaining infection, so that part is pretty much taken care of. As far as PID, I’m not sure she’s been informed of that possibility. I’ll speak to her about it this week. > Thanks for the prompt answers. How is she feeling about it all? That has to be stressful. I hope she realizes that it’s not her fault, it was just a freaky thing that happened to her. I’ve never been pregnant, so I don’t know how I’d feel if that happened to me. ---
**Author:** ![Loopydude](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e56c9b/32.png) [@Loopydude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loopydude)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2004, 2:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oral-contraceptives-pregnancy-and-abortion-may-be-tmi/275154/14 "2004-11-30T02:34:59Z")
FYI, as the wife sent me a-searching after her doctor advised us to use condoms while she was on an antibiotic: Rifampin and rifabutin increase the degradation of both estrogen and progestin by induction of hepatic drug metabolizing enzymes, most especially CYP450 3A4. Some oral contraceptives are/were formulated with a conjugate which must be cleaved, in part by intestinal flora. This alteration is, theoretically, inhibited if the drug you’re taking kills said intestinal flora. Ampicillin can give people the runs, which again could interfere with absorbtion. Besides those drugs which have been shown to increase hepatic metabilism, none have shown any significant ability to interfere with combined OCs. As my wife was on amoxycillin, I’m assuming the doctor was giving her C.Y.A.-type precautions, in case we ever wanted to sue him.