Itchy feet and hands. Please help

[Ftcorrigan]

So I’ve had itchy feet and hands for a couple of days weeks. Mentioned to my midwife over a week ago, she told me to ring the antenatal department. They told me I need a blood test and to ask my doctor to test for bile acids. Doctor will not give me a form until I have has a assessment, no appointments for 3 weeks. I can’t put up with this for much longer I’m barely sleeping.
What can I do to ease this?

Have you got a maternity advice line on your notes? Try them.

If not, I'd just big the hell out of the GP - there is a liver condition that can cause itchy hands and feet that means baby will need more monitoring - cholestatis (think I've spelt it right). I think it most commonly presents after 28 weeks but can be earlier.

Get some acqueous menthol cream in the mean time to help with the itching - it's magic stuff!

I'd be phoning your midwife again to ask if it's safe to wait three weeks.

if it's not safe (and I suspect it's not), she might be able to phone your doctors and sort an earlier appointment for you?

www.nhs.uk/conditions/pregnancy-and-baby/itching-obstetric-cholestasis-pregnant/

How many weeks are you?

I had OC/ICP (different people call it different names) when I was pregnant. It's actually not that big a deal even though it sounds dramatic as pretty much the only thing that will stop it is getting the baby out, so all they can do is give you some medication to hopefully prevent it getting worse, monitor your bloods and give you some cream for the itching. Therefore whether you get "diagnosed" with it now or in 3 weeks time won't make that much difference to your care. In my trust once you get beyond 37 weeks you're put on an OC pathway with very regular blood tests which will determine when they want to get baby out if it hasn't already arrived but I have no experience as I went into labour naturally at 36+6. They won't let you go overdue due to the risk of still birth and were discussing inducing me at 39 weeks which we were going to try and push back to 40 weeks depending on the bile count.

My midwife did the bloods for me at my 32 week appointment and then I went to the day assessment unit in the maternity unit for all of the others. The standard GP wasn't involved at all. The aqueous cream I had is called Dermacool. I believe you can buy it over the counter although I was given several tubs on prescription. If you're struggling contact your maternity triage again and ask if you can come to the day assessment unit for bloods?