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Childbirth

Share experiences and get support around labour, birth and recovery.

Original poster

How is blood loss mesured?

16 replies

Sonilaa · 20/01/2010 14:05

I ask that because with dc1 I lost a lot of blood (500ml was in the birth report) + had a pph a few hours later (again about 500ml). I wonder how they got the numbers?

One can hardly aim for the bucket in that situation

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MissWooWoo · 20/01/2010 14:17

yes, am curious as well, I lost "a pint of blood" at dd birth

gasman · 20/01/2010 18:28

It isn't a precise art but we do try.....
Operating theatres routinely do the following:
swabs are weighed wet then the dry weight subtracted = estimated blood loss

any stuff which is sucked up is measured as a volume (usually some allowance is made for liquor from round the baby).

Any left lying around at the end eg. on sheets/ floor etc is estimated sometimes by mopping it up on cloths with a known dry weight which are then weighed wet.

These methods are employed on Labour ward too but sometimes less precisely.

MissWooWoo · 20/01/2010 19:47

wow! v interesting. thanks

marjean · 20/01/2010 19:51

How interesting, I had no idea...

How about a (home) water birth? I assumed the mws did it on sight. And my other births where majority of blood went on plastic sheets, an old duvet, some towels and the carpet (whoops).

EccentricaGallumbits · 20/01/2010 19:51

tis the precise science of estimation!

also remember that
a. if you give blood you donate 470ml. quite safely.
b. a pregnant woman's blood volume is much bigger than a non-pregnant woman.
c. unless you are already very anaemic 500ml isn't going to make much difference.
But it is very individual - some women can bleed like a stuck pig, all over the floor, 1000ml-ish and still bounce up. Others appear to bleed very little and look like floppy ghosts the day after.

gomez · 20/01/2010 19:58

I knew I was when in trouble when I heard the someone say "We had better start weighing the blood loss."

Oh aye and the splashing on the floor when they took my 'moonboots' off!

Restrainedrabbit · 20/01/2010 20:00

Yes I was the floppy ghost after a less than 150ml blood loss

Lulumama · 20/01/2010 20:11

having to grab a bed sheet to mop up blood loss is a good indicator of PPH .....

MrsBadger · 20/01/2010 20:15

I was always about the reported amount of blood I lost because I was in the pool - must be v hard to measure.

barbareebaahumbug · 20/01/2010 20:50

I can't work out how they didn't know I had lost a lot of blood. I had a blood transfusion 3 days after giving birth after a bllod test showed my hb levels were at around 6. I needed 3 'bags'. Why didn't they see? Where did the blood go? Me and dh vaguely remember someone lifting a big blue bag that looked full of blood when they were clearing up.
Pah!

barbareebaahumbug · 20/01/2010 20:52

Sorry blood not bllod and hb was 6.5 not just 6 (but I dunno what it all means anyway!)

rachelfruitloop · 20/01/2010 21:22

My hb was 6.5 as well and had a transfusion of 4 bags, 3 days after giving birth to DS1. I thought that was a long time after the birth to have a transfusion, makes me feel better knowing you had it too barbareebaahumbug! I STILL wonder how I lost all that blood! Maybe it's best I don't know about it! Just hope it doesn't happen again when I deliver DS2!

BecauseImWorthIt · 20/01/2010 21:34

I've always wondered this. Both of mine were relatively 'clean', and notes for DS1 said I lost 150ml. I always wondered how they knew/measured it, and if that was a lot/not very much! (Clearly it wasn't a lot, as there wasn't any splashed all over the floor!)

BexJ78 · 20/01/2010 22:09

i lost 1600ml...but did not really know much about it apart from my husband saying the delivery room was like something from a horror film and the fact that i was grey for about 3 days afterwards! I did wonder though how hey estimated it so interesting info!

HtheH · 21/01/2010 14:10

I lost 2500ml after the birth of my ds. There was slight panic in the delivery room and lots of alarms. My husband was so calm and kept telling me I was fine, we were the calmest people in the room! I had 2 transfusions after this, but felt terrible for days and was in hospital for 5 days. I couldn't get out of bed for a couple of days without fainting and didn't have the strength to lift up ds on my own for a couple of days. I am convinced that the drugs they pumped into me to try and stop the bleeding effected my breastmilk, as I only had colostrum for what seemed like weeks and my 10lb baby boy needing topping up with formula from day 7. Anyone else have experience of this?

lucjam · 23/01/2010 22:36

I had a pph after dc2, emergency c section, they must have nicked something but didn't realise at the time, they said it was a very dry sedction so they put a drain in incase I lost more internally and sewed me up. Then I proceeded to loose 3,400ml into 6 drain bottles, at one point they couldn't change them quick enough! Was v v v scary. My heamoglobin levels were 4, blood pressure was 20/40, I had 6 transfusions and can no longer donate blood :-(

So I know to the exact ml how much I lost because it was all collected in bottles! Nice!!

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