Pregnancy brings in many new and exciting experiences for women. However, sometimes, there can be chances that these are not always a happy deal for a lady.
Suffering from diseases that can affect your child is a serious problem that will make the condition difficult to deal with. Having sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) is one among this.
It is important to know more about STDs and the health risks that they possess during pregnancy. Along with that, be aware of the different ways how you can manage and treat the condition.
These are important for preventing and managing STDs during pregnancy.
No matter how educated the society is, still many women are not aware of the real facts about STDs.
While some believe that this will happen only to those who lead a wrong lifestyle, some others think that this is not treatable at all.
This makes it more important to create awareness about the real facts of STDs.
Protecting yourself and your baby from STDs is thus very important.
In this article on STDs during pregnancy, we will discuss more about the issues and facts related to STDs. Have a look:
How You Can Get STDs?
STDs affect pregnant women either before getting pregnant or during pregnancy. This can occur if you've had more than one partner before pregnancy or if your partner has had a physical relationship with other women. Another chance is blood transfusion.
What Are The Common STDs?
The most common STDs that you should consider during pregnancy are AIDS, hepatitis B, chlamydia, syphilis, gonorrhoea and hepatitis C. Most of these are included in the prenatal serology checkup as a routine for pregnant women.
Should You Test For STDs?
Sure, you have to test for STDs, even if you have done this before in your life. This is because STDs usually don't have any symptoms to present in the early stages.
So, to be on the safer side, discuss about this to your doctor, especially if you had any high-risk sexual relationship in the past.
How STDs Affect Your Baby?
The risk for your baby depends on the type and seriousness of the STD. While some of these are mild, some others can be life threatening. Most of the virus and bacteria that cause STD can pass through the placenta. These are the effects of STDs during pregnancy.
What Are The Risks To The Baby?
The common effects of STDs on pregnancy are low birth weight, still birth, miscarriage, premature delivery and breakage of the membrane.
Serious cases will transmit the disease as such to the baby, which may lead to the death of the foetus or possess a lifelong risk. These are the effects of STDs during pregnancy.
How To Treat STDs?
Some STDs that are caused by bacteria can be treated with antibiotics. This is successful for infections caused by chlamydia and gonorrhoea. STDs caused by viruses have limited or no treatment options during pregnancy. In such cases, anti-viral drugs are given to women to reduce the risk of the viral transmission to the baby.
How To Prevent STDs?
The main ways to prevent STDs are abstaining from sex with more than one partner, using preventive measures like condoms, getting yourself and your partner tested for STDs, getting blood transfusion from reputed and advanced blood banks, etc.
