Hyperemesis Gravidarum Leading Women To Get Abortions - Because They Don't Feel Supported

Most mums-to-be experience some sickness during pregnancy, but around 10,000 women each year are affected by severe nausea and vomiting – known as hyperemesis gravidarum (HP).  

It can mean that women can’t keep their food down, quickly become dehydrated and often need hospital treatment – like Kate Middleton did with both of her pregnancies. But despite the severity of the pregnancy-related illness, there isn’t enough support available for women suffering from it.

Charity Pregnancy Support Sickness has produced a report on women’s experiences of hyperemesis gravidarum, showing that pregnant women don’t receive the right amount of care and treatment

The report, called ‘I Could Not Survive Another Day’, polled 70 women in the UK who were forced to end their pregnancy because of severe sickness.

The stats showed that fewer than one in 10 pregnant women were offered steroid therapy, which is sometimes an option for women who don’t respond to other anti-nausea medication, and some women are told that steroids can in fact harm their baby – or are simply too expensive to prescribe.

Some 47 per cent of the women featured in the report revealed they had requested medication and been refused – or they hadn’t been offered any at all to help with their symptoms.

One women mentioned in the report was bed-ridden for the fist few months of pregnancy and was being sick up to 30 times a day. She couldn’t keep anything down and ended up losing three stone in weight, the BBC reports.

“I was really weak and couldn’t stand up from dizziness,” the woman, named Lily in the report, recalls. “I couldn’t handle food smells, even the smell of my husband made me vomit. I remember forcing down some beans one day, but within seconds they came back up.”

While Lily’s GP did occasionally call in to see her, the drug she was prescribed didn’t stop the extreme nausea. It wasn’t until she was around 22 weeks pregnant that her hyperemesis gravidarum started to wear off – but she still continued to be sick once a day.

However, when Lily became pregnant with her second child, the combination of HG and a baby to look after was too much for her to handle. “I was begging the doctors for steroids but we had moved house so no-one came to test my urine and I wasn’t admitted to hospital for fluids.”

In the end, Lily gave up asking for medical help with her second pregnancy and felt she had no choice than to terminate the pregnancy. “With all those motherly instincts you have, to terminate a child’s life you’ve got to be desperate. I really felt as if I was on my last legs.”

Sadly, the experience has left Lily unwilling to have another child. “I don’t trust the doctors,” she says. “They don’t take it seriously enough and it would just lead to another termination.”

Caitlin Dean, chair of Pregnancy Sickness Support, says that lots of women are under the impression there aren’t any safe anti-sickness treatments to take during pregnancy. But that’s not the case.

“There is a range of medications all known to be safe and effective which have been around for more than 50 years,” she argues. “And there is plenty of evidence they are not causing any concerns.”

Another expert, Dr Daghni Rajasingam, outlined how women with HG are treated. “We can start by giving women tablets to help the sickness, bring them into hospital to receive intravenous fluids and nutrition if necessary and give steroids in very severe cases.”

It’s not known what causes HG, or why some pregnant women get it and others don’t – but there is some evidence that it runs in families. Doctors may prescribe anti-sickness (anti-emetic) drugs, vitamins B6 and B12 and steroids to help curb the symptoms and the NHS says the evidence suggests the earlier you start treatment, the more effective it will be.

Have you suffered from hyperemesis gravidarum? Let us know in the comments.

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