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Gestational Diabetes

October 22nd, 2009 |

You have 28 weeks of pregnancy. Your health care provider (doctor / midwife) had been informed that you have gestational diabetes. Should you be concerned about gestational diabetes? The short answer: Yes Good control means a lot for your health and the health of your baby.

What is gestational diabetes?
Pregnant women who have never had diabetes but who have high levels of blood sugar (glucose) during pregnancy, they were classified as having gestational diabetes.

Gestational diabetes affects about 4% of all pregnant women. This corresponds to 135,000 cases of gestational diabetes annually in the United States.

We do not know what causes gestational diabetes, but we have some clues. The placenta supports the baby as it grows. The hormones from the placenta help the baby’s development, but these hormones also block the action of insulin in the body of the mother. This problem is called insulin resistance. The insulin resistance prevents the mother’s body to use insulin. You may need up to three times more insulin.

Gestational diabetes starts when your body is not able to make and use all the insulin it needs for pregnancy. Without enough insulin, glucose can not leave the blood and converted into energy. Glucose builds up in the blood to reach very high levels. This is known as hyperglycemia.

How gestational diabetes can affect your baby?
Gestational diabetes occurs in the mother in late pregnancy, after the baby’s little body is fully formed but while the baby is growing. Because of this, gestational diabetes does not cause birth defects as those seen in mothers with diabetes before pregnancy.

However, the lack of treatment or lack of control of gestational diabetes can affect your baby. When a woman has gestational diabetes, your pancreas works too hard to produce insulin, but insulin does not lower glucose levels in the blood. While insulin does not pass through the placenta, glucose and other nutrients do. Therefore, too much glucose in the blood goes through the placenta, giving the baby high blood glucose levels. This causes the baby’s pancreas produce more insulin to rule out blood glucose. As the baby gets more energy than it needs for growth, excess energy is converted into fat.

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