Planning your pregnancy - Personalised pre-conception care and weight optimisation
Your health and weight, before becoming pregnant (pre-conception), can affect your fertility success, your pregnancy outcome, and the health of your child.
Improvements in pre-conception health can be improved by weight optimisation before you become pregnant, if you are overweight or obese.
In addition to improving your fertility, (whether it is natural or IVF), weight optimisation can also improve your pregnancy outcome.
5-15% of weight loss can improve general heath, reduces cardiovascular risks and the risk of diabetes.
Miss Singh can help and support you to achieve this pre-conception weight loss, if you are overweight or obese.
Women who are obese are at greater risk of a variety of pregnancy-related complications compared with women of normal BMI
Some of the complications that can arise in pregnancy are-
• miscarriage
• pre-eclampsia
• gestational diabetes
• venous thromboembolism (VTE)
• dysfunctional or prolonged labour
• caesarean section
• anaesthetic complications
• postpartum haemorrhage (PPH)
• wound infections
Initiation and maintenance of breastfeeding are also more difficult in the women with obesity.
Infants of obese mothers are at increased risk of-
• congenital anomalies
• prematurity
• macrosomia
• stillbirth and neonatal death.
• intrauterine exposure to maternal obesity is also associated with an increased risk of developing obesity and metabolic disorders in childhood.
Weight optimisation reduces the above risks significantly.
There is evidence that for obese women, losing weight between pregnancies reduces the risks of stillbirth, high blood pressure complications, and big babies.
At your first consultation, Miss Singh will see you, and assess your general health, including checking blood pressure, and doing blood tests, to assess your iron levels, vitamin levels, thyroid function, liver and kidney function.
She will provide you with tools to assist with nutrition, diet and exercise.
She can also put you in contact with a specialist personal trainer, to support your nutrition and exercise plan.
After assessing your general health, you may be prescribed weight loss (GLP-1) injections. In addition, you may be prescribed multivitamins.
Miss Singh will see you regularly, to monitor your progress, and to ensure your safety during the health and weight optimisation process. She will also be available between appointments, should any concerns arise.
• Any woman seeking pregnancy (naturally or IVF) whose BMI is more than 30
• Any woman seeking pregnancy whose BMI is more than 27 who also has health or medical issues.
• PCOS
• Thyroid disorders
We look forward to seeing you in our clinic to help you reach your optimal weight goal before pregnancy, to get the most healthy outcome for you and your baby.
