Early in my pregnancy, around 7 weeks, I had laparoscopy twice within 3 days due to suspected ectopic pregnancy. Yes, you read it correctly. I had two laparoscopies when I was seven weeks pregnant with my first baby.
(camera and instruments placed through small incisions)
Both laparoscopies were carried out under general anaesthetic and with an intention to remove the pregnancy if it had found to be outside of the womb (ectopic pregnancy).
Long story short, it was a misdiagnosis. My pregnancy was not ectopic. The pregnancy continued after the surgeries. Although, I had a few complications later on, my son arrived early at 36 weeks with low birth weight (2.3 kg), but other than that very healthy.
You can read more about the pregnancy complications I had after laparoscopy here
My concerns of the effect of laparoscopy on my pregnancy
What I really want to talk more about here is the worry I had regarding the effect of al the laparoscopy procedure in the first trimester to the pregnancy and the fetus.
Certainly, every pregnant women would have the same worry if they had been through anything like this while they are pregnant. After all, we are all worry about our baby from the day we know we are pregnant!
My main cocerns at the time were:
the effect of general aneasthetic and the procedure during the surgery on the baby inside the womb.
Specifically,
- How would general anaesthetic effect my pregnancy and the baby?
- Any short term or long term effect on pregnancy progression and development of the fetus?
- Would the procedure (laparoscopy) have any bad effect to my pregnancy? Will it cause miscarriage later on? or if not, what about birth defects ?
From now on, I will try give you answers to the above questions based on my experience and the discussion I had with doctors.
How would general anaesthetic effect my pregnancy and the baby?
All the doctors I talked to afterward reassured me that general anaesthesia that was used should have no effect to the pregnancy nor the fetus. This is purely based on their experience and the fact that no evidence linking adverse effect of the use of general anaesthesia while pregnant.
The truth is nobody really know for certain. Conducting research in this kind of topic is not ethical, so there is no scientific report to rely on.
The answer I got from reading over various sites and forums is that there should be no problem. For most people who were under general anaesthesia while pregnant, their pregnancy and babies were fine afterward. This is given that doctors who are involved in the process aware that you are pregnant.
In short, no miscarriage or birth defects can be directly linked to exposing to general anaesthesia
As for me, I did not miscarried and my baby was born with no physical defect. Low birth weight and preterm are the only issues my baby had. And it is difficult to pin down what actually the causes.
Would the procedure (laparoscopy) have any bad effect to my pregnancy?
This one is a bit more difficult fir me to answer as I had a few pregnancy complications afterward. One of them is bleeding which generally could happen after laparoscopy.
But because I was pregnant by IVF and bleeding during IVF pregnancy are also quite common. So it is hard to say if the bleeding was a result of the surgery or IVF process or else…
Basically I started to bleed a week after the surgery from weeks 8 and continued to bleed on and off until 18 weeks pregnant, which I wrote more about here.
Another complication set in a bit later, my water broke when I was 24 weeks pregnant. Late onset of this complication suggests there is no direct link to the surgery I had in the first trimester.
However, one of the doctor told me that one reason that could cause waters to break so early is prolonged bleeding during the first or second trimester, which is my case.
Final words
Although it is not possible to know if being under general anaesthesia or laparoscopy were the cause of all the pregnancy complications I had afterward.
One thing I can say is that, against all these hardship and hurdles during my pregnancy, my son has arrived safely. He is now six months old and, apart from being a bit small, he is very healthy and a happy little boy.