Blighted ovum or should I wait???? - February 2025 Babies | Forums | What to Expect (2024)

FAQs

How likely is it to have another blighted ovum? ›

A blighted ovum is often a one-time occurrence, and rarely will a woman experience more than one. Most doctors recommend couples wait at least 1-3 regular menstrual cycles before trying to conceive again after any type of miscarriage.

You are likely to miscarry—pass the ovum tissue—by the end of your first trimester. Medicine may be used to help the tissue pass.

With a blighted ovum, the embryo never forms or stops growing after it's formed.

Blighted ovum is an older term for a certain type of pregnancy that leads to an early miscarriage. It's now known as an anembryonic (an-em-bree-on-ik) pregnancy. With a healthy pregnancy, an egg fertilized by sperm develops into the earliest form of an unborn baby, called an embryo.

A blighted ovum will eventually cause a miscarriage, usually at 7 to 12 weeks of pregnancy. Your body realises that the pregnancy is not developing properly and starts to shed blood and tissue from your uterus.

There are a number of reasons why a blighted ovum can be misdiagnosed. During an early pregnancy visit, your doctor will typically use an ultrasound to look for signs of a viable pregnancy. If the doctor sees what they believe is an empty embryonic sac, they may tell you that you have a blighted ovum.

The first is to let nature take its course and wait for the body to naturally miscarry on its own. Often, this will be within one to two weeks; however it may not always happen. Another option is to speed up the time it takes to progress to miscarriage by taking medication.

Statistics show you will likely have a normal and healthy pregnancy in the future, even immediately after a blighted ovum. In a study involving women with early miscarriages, around 80% were able to have a successful pregnancy within the next five years.

According to the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG), about 10 percent of known pregnancies end in early pregnancy loss. Moreover, the American Pregnancy Association estimates that 50 percent of early miscarriages are caused by a blighted ovum.

How high can HCG get with a blighted ovum? If the level is more than 15,000 ml/Ul and there is no visible sac as it does not increase as quickly as it does in normal pregnancy, it can indicate a complication. The provider will then test the hCG levels over several days to see how the hCG is rising.

Is blighted ovum more common with age? ›

Conclusions: The prevalence of blighted ovum was 15.6%. Also, the prevalence of blighted ovum was statistically significant increased with increase maternal age and also, we noticed that there was a statistically significant association between early pregnancy failure and a history of previous early pregnancy loss.

If blighted ovum is discovered during a prenatal appointment, your doctor will discuss treatment options with you. These may include: waiting for miscarriage symptoms to occur naturally. taking medication, such as misoprostol (Cytotec), to bring on a miscarriage.

It likely occurs as a result of early embryonic death with continued development of the trophoblast. When small, the sac cannot be distinguished from the early normal pregnancy, as there may be a yolk sac, though a fetal pole is not seen.

In normal pregnancies, the yolk sac increases in size to about 11 weeks of gestation, after which it disappears to 12 weeks of gestation. Changes in the size and shape of the yolk sac may be representative of a poor prognosis of pregnancy, especially with miscarriages in the first trimester [3].

This may be the result of genetics, or of poor-quality eggs or sperm. Blighted ovum may be linked to abnormalities within chromosome 9. If you have repeated blighted ovum pregnancies, consider talking to your doctor about a chromosomal analysis of your embryos.

If you have experienced multiple blighted ova or are struggling with miscarriages, there may be a different underlying problem, such as a hormone imbalance or genetic mutation. Your doctor can run tests to identify possible causes for complications in development.

Conclusions: The prevalence of blighted ovum was 15.6%. Also, the prevalence of blighted ovum was statistically significant increased with increase maternal age and also, we noticed that there was a statistically significant association between early pregnancy failure and a history of previous early pregnancy loss.