How Long Can a Baby Be Dead Inside a Mother

KEY POINTS

• Some pregnant people are more likely than others to take a stillbirth. Reducing some of the risk factors for stillbirth may assistance y'all have a healthy baby.

• We don't know what causes all stillbirths. Mutual causes include infections, nascency defects and pregnancy complications, like preeclampsia.

• Yous can have tests to try to discover out what caused your baby's expiry and effort to prevent some other stillbirth in your side by side pregnancy.

• Almost people who have a stillbirth and get pregnant again take a good for you pregnancy and a salubrious infant.

What is stillbirth?

Stillbirth is when a baby dies in the womb after 20 weeks of pregnancy. Virtually stillbirths happen earlier a pregnant person goes into labor, but a minor number happen during labor and birth. Stillbirth affects nearly 1 in 160 pregnancies each yr in the United States.

Who is at risk for stillbirth?

Stillbirth can happen in any family. We don't always know why stillbirth affects certain families more than others. Researchers are working to learn more about take a chance factors for stillbirth.

Take chances factors are things that make you lot at take chances for (more than likely than others to take) a condition. Having a chance factor for stillbirth doesn't mean for certain that you will take a stillbirth. Just knowing about and reducing your risk factors may help forestall a stillbirth from happening to your baby. Some risk factors are things you tin't change, such as having a stillbirth in a previous pregnancy. Other run a risk factors are things you lot can do something about, like quitting smoking. Talk to your health intendance provider about what you lot can do to help reduce your risk factors for stillbirth.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (likewise called CDC) and other experts, risk factors for stillbirth include:

Medical conditions

• Being obese. If you lot're obese, you lot have an excess corporeality of body fat and your torso mass alphabetize (besides called BMI) is 30 or higher. BMI is a measure out of trunk fat based on your height and weight. To detect out your BMI, go to world wide web.cdc.gov/bmi.
• Diabetes. Diabetes is a condition in which your body has too much carbohydrate (chosen glucose) in the claret.
• High blood pressure. Blood pressure is the force of blood that pushes against the walls of your arteries. Arteries are claret vessels that carry claret abroad from your heart to other parts of the body.
• Substance abuse. Using sure harmful substances increase the take chances of having a stillbirth. For example, smoking, drinking booze or using street drugs or prescription painkillers, such every bit opioids.

Pregnancy conditions and pregnancy history

• You lot're pregnant with multiples (twins, triplets or more).
• Y'all have intrahepatic cholestasis of pregnancy (also called ICP). This is the most common liver condition that happens during pregnancy.
• You had complications in a previous pregnancy, similar premature nascency, preeclampsia or fetal growth brake. Preterm birth is a birth that happens besides early on, before 37 weeks of pregnancy. Preeclampsia is a condition that tin can happen after the 20th week of pregnancy or right afterwards pregnancy. Information technology'south when a pregnant person has loftier claret pressure level and signs that some of her organs, like her kidneys and liver, may not be working properly. Fetal growth restriction is when a baby doesn't proceeds enough weight in the womb before nascence.
• Y'all've never given nativity earlier.
• You had a miscarriage or stillbirth in a previous pregnancy. Miscarriage is when a baby dies in the womb earlier twenty weeks of pregnancy.
• You lot're pregnant after the age of 35. According to the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG), studies bear witness that a large number of stillbirths that happen among meaning people 35 or older are related to congenital or chromosomal weather.
• Yous have little social back up. Many unmarried people have strong social networks of families and friends who help them. Notwithstanding, some studies take reported a higher risk of stillbirth among unmarried people. Researchers think that this may be because they have less social back up.

Health Disparities and Racism

We practise non know exactly why, but stillbirth happens more often in some groups compared with others. We call this a health disparity (difference). To understand why these groups are at a higher chance of having a stillbirth we need to wait at the social factors affecting them, this is what nosotros call social determinants of health. These are the conditions in which you lot are born, grow, work, alive and age. These conditions affect your health throughout your life. In many cases, social determinants of wellness and health disparities are related to racism.

Racism refers to the false conventionalities that certain groups of people are born with qualities that make them better than other groups of people.

Racism isn't express to personal attacks such as ethnic slurs, bullying, or physical assault. In a racist civilization, one group of people has more power than other groups. People in the dominant racial or ethnic grouping make important decisions that affects everyone's lives. For example, they have a lot of command over the way that schools, wellness care, housing, laws and law enforcement work. This control ways that people in the dominant group are more probable to:

• Have meliorate teaching and job opportunities
• Alive in safer environmental conditions
• Be shown in a positive light by media, such as tv shows, movies, and news programs.
• Exist treated with respect by law enforcement
• Amend access to health care

In dissimilarity, people from racial or ethnic minority groups who alive in a racist society are more likely to:

• Experience chronic stress
• Alive in an unsafe neighborhood
• Live in areas that have college amounts of environmental toxins, such as air, water, and soil pollution
• Go to a low-performing school
• Have limited access to healthy foods
• Accept little or no access to wellness insurance and quality medical care
• Take less access to well-paying jobs

The Role of Chronic Stress

Studies have shown that the chronic stress caused by living in a racist culture is a gene in many health conditions, including having a preterm or depression-birthweight baby. While some studies and statistics mention race every bit a chance gene for these conditions, nosotros tin can't say that race itself the cause. More research is needed to understand the connections between racism, stress, and health issues.

Rates of Stillbirth

According to information from the CDC (2017), in that location are there are major differences in stillbirth rates among different groups. For Black people, the stillbirth charge per unit is more than double the rate than other groups, except when compared with American Indian/Alaskan Native people. These are rates per 1,000 live births and stillbirths. Run into the data beneath:

• Non-Hispanic Black, x.32
• American Indian/Alaska Native people, seven.22
• Hispanic, 5.01
• Non-Hispanic white, 4.89
• Asian or Pacific Islander, 4.29

Being a person of color is not a cause for having a stillbirth. However, communities of color are disproportionately affected by racism. Racism and diff living conditions bear on their wellness and well-being and puts them at higher risk of pregnancy complications, such as stillbirth.

March of Dimes recognizes that racism and its furnishings are factors in the health disparities in pregnancy outcomes and babies' health. We must work together to bring fair, merely and full admission to health care for all moms and babies.

How exercise yous know if your baby is stillborn?

Signs of a condition are things someone else can see or know about you, like you accept a rash or y'all're coughing. Symptoms are things you feel yourself that others tin't see, like having a sore throat or feeling dizzy.

The most common symptom of stillbirth is when y'all stop feeling your babe moving and kicking. Others include cramps, pain or haemorrhage from the vagina. Call your health care provider right abroad or get to the emergency room if you have any of these conditions.

Your provider uses ultrasound to come across if your baby'south heart has stopped chirapsia. An ultrasound uses sound waves and a computer screen to show a picture show of your baby in the womb.

What are your options for giving nascence if your baby is stillborn?

If your baby is stillborn, your provider talks with yous most options for giving nascence. When and how you give birth depends on how far along you are in your pregnancy, your medical condition and what you think is best for you lot and your family. Some women need to give birth correct away for medical reasons, just it's oft rubber to wait until y'all go into labor on your own. Labor usually starts within 2 weeks after a baby dies in the womb.

Your provider may recommend:

• Dilation and evacuation (besides called D&E). During this surgical process, your provider dilates (opens) the cervix to remove tissue from the lining of the uterus. The cervix is the opening to the uterus (womb) that sits at the top of the vagina. Having a D&E may limit the data your provider can get about your baby's condition. For case, if yous have a D&E, your baby'southward provider can't do an autopsy on your baby.
• Inducing labor. This is when your provider gives you lot medicine or breaks your h2o (amniotic sac) to make your labor offset. Most pregnant people with a stillbirth have their providers induce labor soon after they acquire of their baby's death. If yous decide to wait to go into labor on your own and it doesn't happen past 2 weeks later on your baby's death, your provider may induce labor to help prevent dangerous claret clots from developing.
• Cesarean nascency (also called c-section). This is surgery in which your doctor makes a cut in your belly and uterus to deliver your baby.

What tests practise you get after a stillbirth?

Your provider checks your baby, the placenta and the umbilical cord to try to find out why your baby died. The placenta grows in your uterus and supplies the baby with food and oxygen through the umbilical cord. Your provider may ask to do certain tests to try discover out what caused the stillbirth. Tests may include:

• Amniocentesis (also called amnio). In this test, your provider takes some amniotic fluid from around your infant in the uterus. If your provider thinks a genetic condition or an infection in your baby may have caused the stillbirth, she may recommend an amnio before you give nascence. Genetic conditions are health conditions that are passed from parents to children through genes.
• Autopsy. This is a physical exam of your infant's body after death. During an dissection, a provider checks your baby'due south organs for signs of nativity defects or other conditions. This may help your provider find out what acquired your baby'due south expiry and if you may exist at risk of having another stillbirth in the hereafter. Information technology's common for a provider not to find a cause for stillbirth. Birth defects are wellness conditions that are nowadays at birth. They modify the shape or function of 1 or more than parts of the torso. Birth defects can crusade problems in overall health, how the body develops or how the body works.
• Genetic tests. Genetic tests to check for genetic atmospheric condition in your baby
• Tests for infections on your baby or on the placenta

In add-on to checking your baby for medical and genetic conditions, your provider reviews your family wellness history and any problems or illnesses yous had during pregnancy. Your family health history is a tape of any health conditions you, your partner and members of both your families have had. Your provider may want to test y'all for infections, genetic weather and other medical atmospheric condition, like lupus or thyroid bug.

Information from tests on y'all and your baby may assistance y'all if you lot're thinking near getting significant once more. Test results may help your provider find out if in that location's a take a chance that yous could have some other stillbirth. Even if your provider doesn't find out what caused your stillbirth, having the tests may help you better understand and cope with your baby's death. If you have questions well-nigh the tests, including their cost, talk to your health care provider.

If yous've had a stillbirth, tin can you take a healthy baby in some other pregnancy?

Yes. For nigh women, the chances of having another stillbirth are very low. Less than 1 in 100 women (less than 1 pct) who've had a stillbirth get on to have another stillbirth.

If yous had a stillbirth and are thinking about having some other baby, requite yourself time to heal physically and emotionally. Your provider may recommend that y'all have medical tests to effort to discover out more almost what acquired your stillbirth. You may need to await until after you've had these tests to endeavour to get pregnant once more.

If you had a stillbirth that was acquired by a genetic condition, a genetic counselor can help you understand the condition and the chances of you having another stillbirth. A genetic counselor is a person who is trained to help y'all understand about how genes, nativity defects and other medical conditions run in families, and how they tin touch your health and your baby'south health. Your health care provider can help you lot find a genetic advisor.

Hither's what you can do assist to lower your risk of having a stillbirth in another pregnancy:

• Become a preconception checkup. This is a medical checkup you get before pregnancy. It helps brand sure y'all're healthy when yous get pregnant.
• Get treatment for whatever medical atmospheric condition you have.
• Get to a healthy weight before getting pregnant. Your provider can recommend means to become to a weight that'due south right for you.
• Don't fume, potable alcohol, utilize marijuana or other drugs that tin be harmful to your pregnancy. Tell your provider if y'all need assistance to quit.
• If you have any pain or bleeding from the vagina during pregnancy, call your provider correct away.

If you go pregnant once more, your provider monitors you and your baby closely. At around 32 weeks of pregnancy, she may ask you to exercise kick counts to assistance you keep track of how often your babe moves. Your provider also may do medical tests to cheque your baby'south heart rate and movements.

What causes stillbirth?

We don't know what causes many stillbirths, but mutual causes include:

Infections in the female parent or infant. Some infections may not cause signs or symptoms and may not be diagnosed until they cause serious complications, like premature birth or stillbirth. Infections that can cause stillbirth include:

• Cytomegalovirus (as well called CMV). This is a kind of herpes virus that you can get by coming in contact with torso fluid (like saliva, semen, mucus, urine or claret) from a person who carries the virus. It'due south a mutual infection in young children, simply if you get it during pregnancy, information technology tin can cause serious bug, like stillbirth.
• Fifth disease. This is a common childhood illness that's caused by a virus called parvovirus B19. Information technology usually spreads through the air from an infected person'southward coughing or sneeze.
• Genital and urinary tract infections. These infections affect the urinary tract and genitals (also chosen sexual activity organs), like the vagina or ovaries. The urinary tract is the system of organs (like the kidneys and bladder) that helps your torso get rid of waste and extra fluids. Getting infected with genital canker for the first time during pregnancy can atomic number 82 to stillbirth. Genital canker is a sexually transmitted infection (also chosen STI) you can get from having sex with someone who's infected.
• Listeriosis. This is a blazon of food poisoning.
• Syphilis. This is an STI.
• Toxoplasmosis. This is an infection you can get from eating undercooked meat or touching true cat poop.

Problems with the placenta or umbilical cord. Placental bug include infections, blood clots, inflammation (redness, pain and swelling), problems with blood vessels and other conditions, like placental abruption. Placental abruption is a serious condition in which the placenta separates from the wall of the uterus earlier birth. Placental problems cause well-nigh 24 in 100 stillbirths (24 percentage). Problems with the umbilical cord include having a knot in the cord or the cord being pinched so that your baby doesn't get enough oxygen. Issues with the umbilical cord may atomic number 82 to about 10 in 100 stillbirths (10 percentage).

Complications during pregnancy, including:

• Being meaning longer than 42 weeks
• Diabetes, obesity, high blood pressure and preeclampsia
• Health conditions similar lupus, thrombophilias and thyroid disorders. Lupus is an autoimmune disorder. Autoimmune disorders are health conditions that happen when antibodies (cells in the torso that fight off infections) assail good for you tissue just about anywhere in the trunk by mistake. Thyroid disorders affect your thyroid, a gland in your neck that makes hormones that assist your body store and employ energy from food. Thrombophilias increment your chances of making abnormal blood clots.
• Preterm labor and preterm premature rupture of the membranes (also chosen PPROM). Preterm labor is labor that begins early, earlier 37 weeks of pregnancy. PPROM is when the sac around the babe breaks early, causing labor to start.
• Fetomaternal hemorrhage. This is when your baby's blood mixes with your blood during pregnancy or birth.
• Trauma or injuries (similar from a car blow)

Conditions in the baby, including:

• Birth defects and genetic conditions. Nigh 14 in 100 stillborn babies (xiv percent) have one or more birth defects, including genetic atmospheric condition like Down syndrome.
• Fetal growth brake
• Not getting enough oxygen during labor and nascency
• Rh disease. Rh factor is a protein on the surface of reddish blood cells. Rh disease happens when a woman who doesn't take the protein (chosen Rh-negative) is pregnant with a baby who does have the protein (called Rh-positive). Rh disease tin can exist prevented.

How can you bargain with feelings of grief afterwards a stillbirth?

Grief is all the feelings y'all have when someone shut to you dies. Having a stillborn baby is a painful loss for a family. But there are things you can do to help you grieve, heal and think your babe.

After birth, do what feels right for you and your family unit. You may want to spend time alone with your infant and other family members. You can name your infant, hold your baby, bathe and clothe her and have part in cultural or religious traditions, like baptism. Some families take pictures of their baby, make footprints or salve locks of hair. Yous may exist able to proceed things from the hospital, like blankets, that were used with your baby. Keepsakes like these can assistance y'all and your family recall your babe.

Parents who have a stillbirth need fourth dimension to grieve. You and your partner may cope with grief in different ways, and you may need help dealing with others equally you grieve.

Later yous leave the hospital, certain things, like hearing names you lot were thinking of for your infant, seeing the baby's nursery at dwelling or having your chest milk come in can exist painful reminders of your loss. You may need aid learning how to bargain with these situations and the feelings they create. Inquire your wellness care provider to help you find a grief counselor to aid you cope with your baby's death. Or your hospital may have a loss and grief program for families. Getting counseling tin can be really helpful to yous and your family.

Talking about your feelings with other parents who have had a stillbirth may help you deal with your grief. Visit shareyourstory.org, the March of Dimes online community where families who have lost a infant tin talk to and back up each other. Sharing your story may ease your hurting and help you heal.

Having a stillbirth may make you at run a risk for postpartum depression (too called PPD). PPD is a kind of depression that some women get later on having a baby. Tell your provider if you lot have signs or symptoms of PPD, like feeling depressed well-nigh of the solar day every day, having piddling interest in things you normally like to do, or having problem eating or sleeping.

More information

• From hurt to healing  (gratis booklet from the March of Dimes for grieving parents)
• Share Your Story (March of Dimes online community for families to share experiences with prematurity, nativity defects or loss)
• Centering Corporation (grief information and resources)
• Compassionate Friends (back up for families after the expiry of a child)
• First Candle (support for families with children who died of SIDS or preventable stillbirth)
• International Stillbirth Alliance
• Journey Programme of Seattle Children's Hospital (back up for families after the death of a child)
• At present I Lay Me Down to Sleep (remembrance photography)
• Perinatal Hospice & Palliative Care (resources for parents who find out during pregnancy that their baby has a life-limiting condition
• Share Pregnancy & Baby Loss Back up (resource for families with pregnancy or infant loss)
• Star Legacy Foundation (support for families who accept had a stillbirth)

Final reviewed: Oct, 2020

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Source: https://www.marchofdimes.org/complications/stillbirth.aspx

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