Miscarriage Is Hard Enough Without the Silence |
As physicians, we care for patients in some of the most frightening and devastating moments of their lives. One such instance is early pregnancy loss, also known as miscarriage. For our patients and their loved ones, it’s a sudden, heartbreaking, and deeply painful experience that many never imagined would happen to them.
But miscarriages are very common. In the U.S., at least 15% of recognized pregnancies end in miscarriage, and many losses happen before someone even realizes they are pregnant. Yet, alarmingly, more than half of U.S. adults admit they don’t know the frequency of miscarriages.
Patients often arrive in emergency departments, obstetric offices, or clinics unsure whether their bleeding or cramping is normal or signs of something more serious. When they learn they have had a miscarriage, they often ask whether they did something wrong. In reality, miscarriage is rarely caused by something a patient did, and one of the most important things we remind patients is a simple truth: this is not your fault. In spite of our best counseling, it is hard to shake........