All in Caitlin Dean
You have a patient (not a pregnant women) who is being sick, perhaps post-operatively or due to chemotherapy or an acute condition like appendicitis, viral meningitis or so on. You suspect they may be getting dehydrated and are deciding if you should give them IV fluids. What criteria would you use to assess for dehydration?
After a very difficult start to the year Me and my HG Heroes are heading off into the Canadian Wilderness for 10 days to enjoy some much needed family time.
I worked with a team of media experts to further develop my media skills including my interview technique. It was a great day and allowed me to consolidate the journalism training i did about 5 years ago.
It’s taken over a year to actually sort out a meeting but it’s finally happened… on Wednesday I flew to Ireland for the first meeting of a group of people who are soon to be the Trustees for Hyperemesis Ireland, a charity to support women and families affected by hyperemesis gravidarum in the Republic of Ireland.
When I was pregnant I wet myself almost every time I spewed up, which was A LOT... there I've said it, on the internet for all to see. And quite frankly, after pushing three kids out of my vagina, my day to day continence isn't what it once was regardless of the hyperemesis. So, imagine my delight when I saw Carol Smillie's pants last year... they are made for women like me. But over to Carol the Knicker Queen to tell you about her own run in with pregnancy sickness and her fabulous undies for leaky ladies...
Back in May of this year Pregnancy Sickness Support held its biennial Volunteer Conference in Bristol.
Michelle Nicholson presented her MSc Dissertation qualitative research detailing the beneficial effects of writing therapy for women who have suffered all levels of pregnancy sickness. (You can read more about this here)
In a sea of puke, pain and suffering comes a beacon of hope for women with Hyperemesis Gravidarum. The launch of the first ever Green Top Guidelines by the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists is here today. These guidelines will provide a comprehensive and evidence based treatment plan for women who present with pregnancy sickness which is worse than the regular old morning version.
As you are likely to know, research into hyperemesis gravidarum (HG) has been massively hampered by the simple fact that as yet we have no agreed definition of HG and no agreed outcome measures for testing treatment.
The results from the ginger survey I did at the start of the year have no been published in a peer reviewed midwifery journal for all to see. This means that whenever a healthcare professional looks up treatment for hyperemesis or does a literature review to see what treatments do and don’t have evidence for being safe and effective this piece of research will appear and blows the nonsense “ginger might help” papers out of the water. Yes it has flaws, it was an online survey of self selected participants and covered a long time period (in research terms). But it was over 500 participants who had all been admitted to hospital for HG and the results were close to unanimous… STOP SUGGESTING GINGER FOR HYPEREMESIS GRAVIDARUM
Christmas is a particularly tough time of year for women suffering hyperemesis gravidarum, especially if they already have little children. Guilt can be increased almost exponentially as visions of happy memories being created for Christmas craft activities with kiddies and songs around the Christmas tree are replaced with the grim reality of vomit bowls, consent nausea, pissy pants and general misery.
Woman: “Doctor, Doctor, I’m being sick 30 times a day, I haven’t drank for 3 days and passed out from it this morning”
Doctor: “Don’t worry that’s totally normal”
You may have noticed that I’m rather quiet these days… I’m sorry… I am actually drowning under a sea of research papers, assignments and conferences!
During the summer holidays I found out that I’d been accepted into Plymouth University to do a full time Masters in Clinical Research (MClinRes). So last week I went back to school!
This post if for family and friends of women suffering hyperemesis gravidarum who don’t really know what is happening to their friend but would like to know more so they can help and support them… because that’s what family and friends do right… help and support each other!
Pregnancy is a strange phase of life… it seems that as soon as you get that little blue line everyone and his dog has nonsense advice and ludicrous old wives tales about the condition you’re in… from whether your bump “looks like” a boy or a girl to advice about not raising your arms above your head or the cord will wrap around the babies neck…
Okay okay, so the HG world rallied! And I’m not a quitter!
Thank you all for your kind messages of support and appreciation for my work. I’ll carry on for now!
Last weekend I was at the Britmums conference and I attended a seminar entitled “Shouting Back: Women’s voices loud, proud & online”. In it we heard how easy it is [for celebrities like Katy Hill] to “make a difference” just by tweeting occasionally. At the end I had the opportunity to ask a question of the esteemed panel and I so I explained what I do and asked if they had any tips about keeping motivated for those of us trying to raise awareness day in and day out online when it feels like our voices are just lost. I was helpfully informed by the aforementioned celeb that what I ought to do to raise awareness about hyperemesis gravidarum is “write a blog post about your experience of the condition and how it’s the thing Kate Middleton suffered with…. And then, like… tweet it!”, Easy!!!
Since the hugely successful launch of my book on hyperemesis gravidarum last year I’ve been slogging away on another little project aimed at helping families battling the condition with children in tow.
The time has come… I must generate income in order to help fund the Hyperemesis Improvement Movement. I already donate vast amounts of money to the UK effort (not to mention working full time for free supporting women and running PSS) and I would like to be able to do more!
You have a cupboard full of antiemetics and know which one to take for every possible “type” of nausea
