Apologies for resurrecting this thread and hope it doesn't reopen old wounds for those who've posted. This is my first post on Mumsnet and googling cervical shock is what brought me here - sounds like cervical shock was what happened to you too. As there is hardly any information available online and apparently no support for people who have suffered the added trauma of miscarrying in this way. I'm hoping writing this will be kind of cathartic for me but also helpful to anyone who might have gone through a similar experience and can't find any information online.
I have had two miscarriages, both of which got stuck on their way out and resulted in cervical shock. I had no bleeding before the shock started, just intense, all-encompassing pain and a gut feeling that something was very wrong. I was losing my vision, unable to stay still, could not feel my arms, was confused, struggling to hear, and I felt like I was going to die. Both times I was made to wait in A&E for hours, with my partner constantly badgering nurses but being fobbed off and told to wait. It is extremely difficult to get medical help unless you are showing outward signs of miscarriage (for example heavy bleeding) and we found outselves stonewalled by nurses telling us not to worry unless I was filling up a sanitary towel every hour.
For the first miscarriage, my partner eventually managed to convince someone to take my BP and it was 50/30 - cue being rushed into resus. The A&E doctors appeared confused and assumed the shock was due to blood loss so I was hooked up to a drip, which did not do much to improve my stats. I was given morphine for the pain but I was still in agony. A forty minute wait ensued before a gynecologist was available to examine me and pull out the blockage. This helped the pain a bit but sadly for me the relief was not instantaneous as it is for some people.
The story was worse for the second miscarriage as we knew what was happening but A&E staff eould not listen: the A&E wait was longer and there was no morphine until after the gynecologist had removed the clots as, in typical man fashion, he was sure I would be absolutely fine once he had done his bit (I was not and the pain would continue for days). Some of the nurses were equally infuriating by telling me, "usually the woman would have bleeding, and usually they would pass out and be rushed into theatre" and "usually you would not have any pain afterwards", which seemed to be a way of excusing the fact that they left me in A&E for hours. As midwives like to tell us all the time, no two pregnancies/bodies are the same, but the fact that I didn't bleed, and the fact that my body can still hold on to consciousness with a BP of 50/30 might be unusual but it is not my fault.
Anyway, I had a crap experience of the NHS but I'm glad to read that others got the help they needed. Also, both miscarriages happened during covid times, so I understand that A&E would have been under massive pressure. That said, I do think that awareness of cervical shock needs to be improved, and that there needs to be less focus on the amount of blood loss and more focus on taking women's pain more seriously.
Sorry for the rant. Going to try to get some counselling maybe, haha...