I’ve heard that it is a good idea to wait at lease six months after a cesarean section before getting pregnant again.
Why exactly is this a good idea? What are the risks? Uterine rupture? How dangerous are the risks? What are the chances that the mother will die, will suffer serious consequences, or that the new baby will die, or will suffer serious consequences?
How do these risks decrease over time? How much lower are these risks with a pregnancy six months after a c-section vs. a pregnancy only 2 months after a c-section?
Ideally I’d like to see studies with real numbers, but I’d appreciate even an enumeration of the risks and a logical explanation for why they decrease with time.
Well, your uterus has just been cut open, so I’d think they want to make good and sure that incision has healed adequately before you start putting pressure on it again. Depending on the general health and healing abilities of the individual, I would think uterine rupture would be a very real possibility. Probably not fatal to the mother, but very dangerous to the fetus.
Think about a cut on your hand that needs stitches. After a week or two it’s healed enough to get the stitches out, but that tissue is still very tender and easily reinjured for a while, right? Same with any other body part. In this case, the uterus isn’t just healing a partial thickness cut, it’s dealing with a full thickness cut. So it takes longer to heal enough to be very strong at all.
Also, I don’t know if the absorbable suture material in the uterine wall would affect the health of a pregnancy at all, but I do know that stuff takes several months to break down and be absorbed.
IANAD but I used to be an EMT and my wife Cyn is a labor and delivery RN who was telling me about this last night due to coming across one at work.
Uterine rupture is a major life threatening emergengy for mom and baby. If the uterus splits open the baby will be expelled into the peritoneal space. Baby is now squirming around with your intestines and can cause additional damage and bleeding above and beyond the massive bleeding from the rupture itself. Detachment or damage to the placenta is a real danger and will be lethal to baby in just 5-10 minutes. Even though pregnant moms can tolerate serious bloodloss well, this is more than bodies are built to take. IIRC the uterus depends on being able to contract back down to regular size to help clamp off all of the blood vessels feeding the placenta. If the uterus is torn open, its ability to contract is compromised and will continue to bleed uncontrollably without surgical intervention and or maybe drugs (pitosin?)
Until 50-60 years ago IIRC this was lethal to mom damn near every time and baby most of the time.
My twin boys were c-sectioned 3 weeks early because they were afraid she was going to rupture (6-11 and 6-12 at birth)
Okay, maybe I should have qualified that one a little bit. Probably not fatal to the mother if she receives prompt medical intervention. Given proper care and early enough treatment, the mother has a decent chance to pull through. It just won’t be a fun recovery. Of course, anyone who doesn’t follow their doctor’s advice about taking a six month break between pregnancies isn’t likely to haul ass to the hospital immediately either.
I didn’t go into the gory details of what a uterine rupture entails because I figured the mere fact that you could rupture an internal organ and put your baby in danger would be deterrent enough.
BTW, the hormone you’re thinking about is oxytocin, which is sometimes called pituitrin. There are lots of trade names for it.
Ignorance police, indeed. You just wait till Dolly the Vicious Attack Hound gets done with you, buddy.
IANAD but I used to be an EMT and my wife Cyn is a labor and delivery RN who was telling me about this last night due to coming across one at work.
Uterine rupture is a major life threatening emergengy for mom and baby. If the uterus splits open the baby will be expelled into the peritoneal space. Baby is now squirming around with your intestines and can cause additional damage and bleeding above and beyond the massive bleeding from the rupture itself. Detachment or damage to the placenta is a real danger and will be lethal to baby in just 5-10 minutes. Even though pregnant moms can tolerate serious bloodloss well, this is more than bodies are built to take. IIRC the uterus depends on being able to contract back down to regular size to help clamp off all of the blood vessels feeding the placenta. If the uterus is torn open, its ability to contract is compromised and will continue to bleed uncontrollably without surgical intervention and or maybe drugs (pitosin?)
Until 50-60 years ago IIRC this was lethal to mom damn near every time and baby most of the time.
My twin boys were c-sectioned 3 weeks early because they were afraid she was going to rupture (6-11 and 6-12 at birth)
Can’t give specific medical risks regarding a pregnancy soon after a caesarian, but if I remember my pregnancy books correctly, it’s generally though to be a good idea to wait a while after any sort of delivery before becoming pregnant again. And in my own experience ( two Caesarians 13 months apart) there are plenty of reasons why space is a good idea without gettting into specific medical risks like uterine rupture.
