Anaemia and home birth- please advise!

[PregnantGrrrl]

Have just got my 28 wk blood test results (despite now being 36wks) and it says i have a low count.

Does this mean i can't have my home birth? A friend has been told she can't use the pool at the birthing unit because she's anaemic, so i'm worried i can't have a home birth now

Any ideas / advice?

There is plenty of time for your haemoglobin to increase before due date.

Just be sensible about your diet and any iron medication prescribed.

Good luck with the home birth plan.

i hope so. what i'm worried about is that there won't be enough time to re-test me. Reading the home birth website though, it says they can't refuse me one on those grounds, just advise against it.

i have some pregnancy vitamins with iron. will have to get some steak and eggs down me aswell i suppose!

Please don't worry Pregnantgirl, well not yet! lol

What was the Hb reading? or did they not tell you?

It says:

MCV and MCH low,
HB g/dl : 10.4

Slurp down that iron tonic stuff in huge quantities. Good luck. I had a lowish count, and they did worry, but I got my HB.

hi pregnantgrrrl
I am 35.5 weeks and also anaemic and my midwife has said nothing about not being happy to go ahead with my homebirth.
Your GP/midwife will probabyl have had the results before you received them in the post (mine did anyway) and if they were worried they'd have mentioned it presumably.
why not give your mw a ring and see what she says?
I can't imagine it's grounds for refusing your HB though

10.4 isn't too bad, could be improved and may have done already, so don't stress.

Is this your first baby?

My neice was not allowed to have a homebirth unless her iron levels rose to "normal". She drank copious doses of this liquid iron stuff for a few weeks and then her iron levels were fine.

take spatone with orange juice, avoid tea and coffee, eat dark green leafy veg, red meat, apricots and dark chocolate, they all help to get iron levels up !

My levels dropped to 10.4, and I feel dreadful, get puffed going from room to room, and just so knackered, have been on my iron tablets for 2 weeks and really not feeling that much benefit yet! Any idea when they should start kicking in, have been feeling like this for months, but they have only just done blood tests!

nonametoday- no, it's my 2nd baby.

thanks guys- from what i can see, they can't refuse me a home birth, and there's no evidence of increased risk of PPH either. It might mean i find it harder to recover afterwards, but i'd rather do that here than in a hospital.