How long should heavy bleeding last after medical miscarriage?

[Poppy10121]

I had a missed miscarriage at 10 weeks (baby had stopped growing and no heartbeat) and due to Covid-19 my hospital aren’t offering surgical options. I was sent home with medical management tablets which I took on bank holiday Monday. Within a few hours I had bad cramps and bleeding, followed by contractions-like pain for around 2 hours. The pain was awful but bleeding was lighter than a period and only a small amount of mucus/clots seemed to come out. After a few hours I felt better and when I spoke to EPU the next day they said some people do just experience light bleeding, no problem. I started to feel a lot better in the days that followed, even doing some exercise, but fast forward to yesterday (9 days after medical management) I got sudden intense cramps and contractions again, suddenly started passing loads of blood and clots. The pain was so bad I could only lie on the bed and writhe, between trips to the loo. This went on for around 4 hours, at the end of which I passed a lump around the size of 2 fingers. The cramps eased to a low throb and stayed that way for about 20 hours but now they’re back at high intensity, heavy bleeding again ... what’s going on? Did the medical management fail and now I’m miscarrying naturally? The EPU have been no help they just say unless I’m changing pads every 30mins it’s fine. I’m currently changing them about once an hour.

Hi Poppy, I'm so sorry to hear you're going through this. Sometimes medical management doesn't get 'everything' in the first go which means you might require another dose or surgical management.

The general advice if you're in bad pain and bleeding heavily when having natural MC or medical management, is to attend at A&E. How are you feeling right now?

If you are in bad pain and discomfort currently, I would attend at A&E - not wanting to attack the NHS, but I think sometimes we have to advocate for ourselves, and attending at the hospital in advance can help ease the path to EPU if they haven't been overly helpful thus far.

If you think EPU will listen, then I would call them first thing again tomorrow and emphasize the pain and discomfort you are in - hopefully they can get you in for a scan and see if everything is gone, or if there are still tissues in there.

Thanks for your reply @tryingtimes20 sorry I missed it on Thursday. I think the medical management must have failed because I have had a lot more pain and bleeding this week which seems from what I’ve read like what would be expected in a natural MC. On Thursday evening I passed another large lump which I think may have been the embryo. Since then the cramps have got a lot less bad and bleeding is more like period level. I’m just desperate for it to be over, I feel like I never know when it’s going to pick up again.

No problem Poppy ; I'm sorry you're still a bit in limbo.

I'm not a medical professional, and the only way it can be confirmed that everything is 'over' is with a scan, but from the anecdotal experiences you can find by searching on here, it sounds like what you described on Thursday is maybe the worst bit done? Just keep any eye on yourself and see how you feel.

If it would help you at all, there is a thread [[www.mumsnet.com/Talk/miscarriage/3887013-Missed-Miscarriage here] with ladies who are currently going through (M)MC/awaiting MM - please come and post with us there if you need any more reassurance xx

Sorry, I messed up posting the link - it's here.

Thank you for your message @tryingtimes20 I missed it at the weekend for some reason.
In case anyone else finds this thread in future, the bleeding got a lot less after that and has pretty much tailed off now.
EPU just constantly said unless I was filling 1 pad in 30mins, stay home - I guess because of the current situation they don't want people in hospital.
Hopefully it's over now for me.