Pregnancy and diabetes: Planning for pregnancy
Why should you plan for pregnancy when you have diabetes?
During the first few weeks of pregnancy, the baby's organs are already forming. If your blood sugar is high during that time, it can affect how your baby's organs develop and can cause birth defects. But if your blood sugar is under control when you get pregnant, you lower the risk that your baby will have problems. Most women don't know that they are pregnant until after those first weeks. Also, women whose blood sugar is not controlled before they get pregnant tend to have more miscarriages. So it's important to plan ahead to get your blood sugar under control before you start trying to get pregnant.
High blood sugar during pregnancy can also lead to other problems, including:
- A larger-than-normal baby at birth. When the mother has high blood sugar, the extra sugar is passed on to the baby. This causes the baby to get bigger. Big babies can cause problems for both mother and baby during delivery.
- Low blood sugar in the baby after birth. This happens because the baby's body releases more insulin to deal with the extra sugar during the pregnancy. Sometimes the baby's body continues to release more insulin after the baby is born. This can lead to low blood sugar, which can be an emergency if it's not treated.
- Jaundice, which means that the skin and the whites of a baby's eyes appear yellow because of a buildup of bilirubin in the blood. Bilirubin is a yellow-brown substance produced by the breakdown of red blood cells in the body. Women who have diabetes are more likely than those who don't have diabetes to have babies with jaundice.
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| Author: | Merrill Hayden | Last Updated: November 14, 2007 |
| Medical Review: | Caroline S. Rhoads, MD - Internal Medicine Kirtly Jones, MD - Obstetrics and Gynecology | |
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