PPH - over 40

[Alwayssomething14]

Any mum's to be over 40 who've had a previous PPH or had one after 40?

I've read "advanced maternal age" increases the risk along with pre-eclampsia. My last pregnancy 10 years ago ended in with mild pre-eclampsia, I was admitted at 39 and 1 and induced 39 and 6. DD spent 36 hours in nicu and both of us kept in for 5 days. I also believe I had a pph, I was bleeding heavily after delivery and only after 3 days was my blood levels checked and given iron tablets. 43 now and worried of the risks. Any advice or experiences greatly appreciated.

I had a large PPH with my first and they were so on it with my second. Had tranaxamic acid drip ready to go, and this time only lost 150 mls compared to 1.2 litres last time. If they know about your previous one they'll take precautions.

It’d be pretty unusual to not do bloods until day 3 after even slightly higher than usual blood loss - it’s a pretty much reflex thing to do if it looks like blood loss is unusually high. It would also be unusual though to not check bloods at all before 3 days if you had PET too - any chance they did do them earlier while you were too knackered/unwell to remember? Probably be worth asking to go through your notes and debrief with a MW so you can get a better idea re exactly what happened and with that in mind make a plan for the next.

This is a good point - they ran my bloods immediately, and then again the next morning having kept me overnight. They were tossing up between an infusion and tablets, but were definitely looking at the numbers.

Thanks ladies. I honestly don't remember bloods being taken, it was an instrumental birth, I was cut and needing sewing up, the nurses/midwives were mopping the blood off the floor 🙈 my poor mum nearly passed out, part of the reason I didnt rush back into it. DD wasn't breathing she was worked on and rushed off, DH and my mum followed her and I was left in the room alone for awhile. It was all pretty traumatic. I felt awful, my showers felt like it was just pouring out of me, I was naive and didn't ask too many questions, I was just relieved it was over and DD was ok. But my iron levels were definitely checked day 3 with a finger prick test and at that point given tablets. I did ask at a later date how much loss was recorded and it was 500ml on paper. Just didnt fit with what we saw and left me scared to be honest.
Unfortunately we need to TFMR in Dec 22 and I was left with retained tissue. The procedure that followed should've been a straight forward day case, but I bled heavily, needed oxytocin to contract and then tranexamic tablets over night (I think that's what they are called) kept in again. It's just been traumatic, I wish I could leave it in the past and just enjoy another pregnancy.

Hmm that does seem a bit suspect - either it wasn't a PPH (upto 500mls in a vaginal delivery and a litre in a C-section is considered normal) and they weren't that concerned, or they haven't looked after you very well. For me, they were mopping up with incontinence bed pads and weighing those to work out blood loss. It looked like a murder scene - I was astonished how civilised my second birth was by comparison! I was pretty chilled despite an emergency team coming in when they couldn't stop my bleeding, so to see you can have a baby without blood gushing off the bed was an interesting finding. There is an increased risk of pph if you've had one before (but it's small) and again if you're older, but if they are aware of both issues which they should be then you'll be fine.