placenta

The placental growth factor (PGF) is an important growth hormone for your baby’s development. As its name implies, this hormone is released from your placenta during pregnancy. It is very important that your placenta produces enough PGF, because if not the blood vessels in your placenta will narrow rather than widen, causing high blood pressure […]

Human chorionic gonadotropin (hCG) is the king of all pregnancy hormones, so much so that some people call it “the announcer of pregnancy”. From the moment you conceive your body starts to produce hCG, therefore it is the hormone that all pregnancy tests measure in order to determine if you are pregnant or not. hCG […]

PPH or postpartum haemorrhages are treated in stages depending on how major the PPH is and at what point the bleeding stops. Here is a step-by-step look at the treatment procedure of a PPH. 1. Injection or IV (intravenous) of either oxytocin or misoprostol, though oxytocin is the preferred medication, together with a massage of […]

Four main causes of PPH have been identified, they are as follows: 1. A uterine atony, in which your uterus does not contract and continues to bleed after birth (it is usually caused by placental retainment or an infection) 2. A retained placenta, or just some of placental and/or fetal tissue. 3. Trauma, which includes […]

CVS or chorionic villus sampling is a diagnostic, prenatal test used to test for chromosomal abnormalities in a fetus between week 10 and week 14 of pregnancy. It is preferred to amniocentesis if you are less than 15 weeks pregnant, but need to check for abnormalities. In CVS, samples of the chorionic villi (the extensions […]

The third stage of labour is a piece of cake after making it through the first stage and second stage of labour. It starts at the end of your baby’s birth and ends with the delivery of your afterbirth or placenta. It lasts for anywhere between 5 and 30 minutes, though less than 10 minutes […]

The amniotic sac, which some people refer to as “the bag of waters”, is the sac of membranes in your womb in which your baby grows. The amniotic sac is made up of two thin, but strong, transparent membranes: the amnion and the chorion. The amnion is the inner membrane which contains your baby and […]

The placenta is known as the afterbirth once you enter the third stage of labour. Unfortunately mum, once you’ve delivered your gorgeous baby your job is not quite done as you will then have to deliver the afterbirth. The best way to think about this part of labour is to remind yourself that after delivering […]

The placenta is a fetomaternal organ that is formed after fertilisation when the zygote implants into the mother’s uterine lining. It has 2 main components: the fetal placenta, which develops from the zygote, and the maternal placenta, which grows from the mother’s uterine tissue. The placenta grows throughout your pregnancy and at 40 weeks will […]