Question : Would Sleep Apnea, during pregnancy – cause a Miscarriage?
Okay, so last year I miscarried at 6 weeks – but I didn’t even find out I was pregnant for sure until I was in the middle of misscarrying (took tests religiously everday for weeks, never registered positive until 1 day into the miscarriage) – if you read back on my questions about a year ago, I had about 10 x-rays to my stomach around implantation, and 3 weeks later began to bleed heavily. I blamed the x-rays all this past year, up until the other day when I got to thinking about SLEEP APNEA and pregnancy…..there is a chance I am pregnant right now, but this had NEVER crossed my mind until recently. It would make sense right?? A woman quits breathing 59 times an hour while she’s sleeping – that’s a part of EVERY minute, every hour….so it’s cutting off oxygen to the placenta…..anyone ever stopped and thought about this before??….Now I’m almost 100 percent sure it caused my miscarriage last year, and am terrified this time around. If I am pregnant I would be 4 1/2 – 5 weeks and I don’t go back for my cpap (breathing maching) fitting until this friday, and then it will take another 10 days after that before I can get my machine from the Medical Supply store…that’s IF sleep apnea caused the miscarriage a year ago….what do you think?
Tagged with: Apnea • Cause • during • Miscarriage • pregnancy • question • Sleep • Would
Filed under: Sleep Apnea Causes
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Actually, my wife developed sleep apnea during pregnancy (found out in third trimester), so we were naturally concerned. Even got the sleeping mask / cpap machine (quite late). We were concerned about oxygen levels as well, but not miscarriage. We were more worried about fetal growth retardation, birth defects/brain damage and things of that sort. Everything turned out perfectly fine.
There has been no research found linking sleep apnea to miscarriage yet. However, there are studies linking sleep apnea to fetal growth retardation. In your case, miscarriage at 6 weeks is almost definitely not because of sleep apnea. There are a handful of more likely reasons (such as chomosomal issues) for that. This early, the baby / fetus is tiny and doesn’t need much oxygen to begin with and whatever it does need it is the first one to draw it from your body. Your blood does stores oxygen, so even if you are not breathing (temporarily), your body can function. Even with sleep apnea, the oxygen saturation level is usually above 85%.
Also, at six weeks, there is no placenta to begin with. Placenta is still forming and only takes over supplying the baby with oxygen/nutrition by 10-12 weeks.
In second or third trimester (once placenta takes over), then it when you start to need worrying a lot more. Sleep apnea “may” cause slower fetal growth and complication if hypertension develops. So, you should definitely get the CPAP machine (get the auto one) for the pregnancy and use it.
If you want to minimize chance of miscarriage, take progesterone suppositories and baby aspirin for the first trimester. talk to your doctor about it.
Good luck with the pregnancy.