Gestational diabetes - Dangers for pregnant women & babies
Gestational diabetes usually develops between the 24th and 28th weeks of pregnancy. Gestational diabetes can affect the health of the mother and baby.
1/4/2023 9:16:18 AM
1. Symptoms and causes of gestational diabetes:
Gestational diabetes rarely causes obvious symptoms. If symptoms are encountered, they may be mild, such as fatigue, blurred vision, extreme thirst, an excessive need to urinate, and a yeast infection. The disease is detected during routine visits of pregnant women.
The exact cause of gestational diabetes is unknown, but hormones may play a role. When a woman is pregnant, her body produces a greater number of hormones, including:
- Human placental lactogen.
- Other hormones increase insulin resistance.
These hormones affect the placenta and help maintain the pregnancy. Over time, the amount of this hormone in your body increases. They can start to make your body resistant to insulin, the hormone that regulates blood sugar.
Insulin helps move glucose out of the bloodstream into the pregnant woman's cells, where it is used for energy. During pregnancy, the body naturally becomes mildly insulin resistant, so more glucose is available in the blood to pass on to the fetus.
If insulin resistance becomes too strong, blood sugar levels can rise abnormally. This can cause gestational diabetes.
2. People at risk of gestational diabetes:
- Pregnant women have a higher risk of developing gestational diabetes if they have high blood pressure, have a family history of diabetes, were overweight before pregnancy, gain more than normal weight while pregnant. pregnant. Or a previous pregnancy that gave birth to a baby weighing more than 4kg or a history of gestational diabetes.
- Women who have had an unexplained miscarriage or stillbirth, have been taking steroids such as glucocorticoids, or have polycystic ovary syndrome, other conditions associated with insulin resistance...
- The International Diabetes Federation (IDF) also encourages doctors to screen women for type 2 diabetes at the start of pregnancy. If you have risk factors for type 2 diabetes, your doctor will likely check you at your first prenatal visit.