Pregnant women who experience morning sickness are less likely to miscarry, according to an American study.
More than one in two pregnant women experience nausea and vomiting until the 4thth month of pregnancy. A difficult period and dreaded by future mothers. However, morning sickness would be a good sign: it is associated with a reduced risk of miscarriage, according to one study American published in the journal JAMA Internal Medicine.
To carry out this work, researchers from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) relied on the medical records of 797 pregnant women. Among them, 188 pregnancies were terminated by spontaneous abortion. From the 2th week of pregnancy, participants were asked to write down in a notebook all the times they felt nauseous. After the 8th week, they received a monthly questionnaire to follow the evolution of these symptoms.
A risk reduced by 50 to 75%
The follow-up of these parturients shows that from the 8th week of pregnancy, nearly 6 in 10 women experienced nausea and nearly 3 in 10 report nausea with vomiting. The researchers’ analysis reveals that pregnant women suffering from this symptom have a reduced risk of miscarriage by 50 to 75% compared to women who do not experience this little hassle.
“Our study confirms that there is a protective link between morning sickness and vomiting and a reduced risk of spontaneous abortion”, comments the head of the work Stéfanie Hinkle.
Causes still unknown
However, this work does not provide an explanation for the occurrence and disappearance of these disorders. Even today, their exact origin is still a mystery. Scientists suggest that morning sickness is a means of protecting the fetus against toxins or microorganisms brought in by its mother’s diet.
Although the causes are not known, it is possible to reduce them on a daily basis by avoiding foods that are too fatty or odors that are too disturbing. Splitting meals throughout the day so you never have an empty stomach can also help. But the gynecologists are unanimous: there is no list of foods to favor or to proscribe because every pregnant woman is different and the onset of nausea varies from one woman to another.
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