Bridget's Pregnancy Blog

Among the many things I’ve learned during this pregnancy, one thing is certain- prenatal checkups involve an awful lot of blood draws! I feel like I’ve been pricked and poked with about a thousand needles by now.

For those just starting on this pregnancy journey who are afraid of needles, don’t worry too much about it. Many of the blood tests are simple ones that only involve a little prick on the tip of a finger. Those are basically checking for the basic levels of things like hemoglobin (which carries iron) in your blood. A low hemoglobin number usually indicates an iron deficiency, common in pregnancy since the baby is pulling a lot of iron out of the mom’s system and the mom’s blood is increasing in volume anyway. The solution for this minor problem is a simple one, either adding more iron to the diet in the form of red meat or taking an iron supplement. I had this problem at my 20 week appointment blood test but iron supplements and diet have cleared it up by now.

One of the more serious things that can be discovered in a blood draw is the possibility of high blood sugar, which can indicate potential gestational diabetes. I had this, too, at my 24 week appointment. (Sometimes I also feel like I’m the Queen of prenatal complications!) The test for this comes in a few parts. The first is a blood draw an hour after you drink a really nasty tasting sugar water concoction. If that test shows high blood sugar, you’ll have to go in for the three-hour OGTT, the Oral Glucose Tolerance Test.

For the OGTT, they took my blood when I came in, after fasting overnight, then made me drink two cups of the nasty glucose solution. Then they took blood at 1, 2, and 3 hours after. The results for this test show how the body reacts to sugar over time, and if these results show high blood sugar in two of the four samples, then you’ll be diagnosed with gestational diabetes.
If this happens, the doctor will recommend a diet to keep your blood sugar levels steady or possibly insulin shots if the sugar levels are very high. Most of the time, the OGTT results come out in a normal range and the woman doesn’t have to do anything different.

Mine were a little high at two of the points, so technically, I have mild gestational diabetes. In my case, the doctor had me eat small meals or snacks five times a day, cut out a lot of sugary stuff and focus on complex carbohydrates and proteins. A week later, a quick finger-prick glucose test two hours after a meal showed perfect glucose levels, so my prescription is to keep up the diet and they’ll keep an eye on my sugar levels when I come in for checkups.

Overall, the blood tests might be an annoyance, but it’s good to have them, because they definitely do point out potential problems early. And most of the problems diagnosed through blood tests are fairly easy to fix as long as they are known about and monitored.