8 day headache
 

im pregnant and my blood pressure has been getting higher over the past few days (i know this because ive been in hospital a lot in the last few days) i was wanderimg what is considered high blood pressure for a pregnant women. im also not sure wheater to tell people becasue my blood pressure has been taken my many differnet department liek the maternal assesment unit, a&e and my doctor so they dont know its getting slowly higher.

also if my migrane hasnt gone away by friday i have to go in and have a potentially dangerous brain scan which could harm my baby and then a lumber puntcher to extract liquid from my brain. has anyone had one? are they really painful? do they even give you anesticic? they havent relaly expalined teh risks to my baby if i have this scan so i really dont knwo what to do. i just want this excrusiating headache and sickness to go away.

Sorry, as you're under the care of a doctor it is against us to give you advice regarding what they may be doing and what this could cause as we don't know the full story. You need to ask these questions to your doctors.

I would advise that each time you have your BP taken you do note it down and therefore you have a record the staff can see at quick glance the pattern that it is following as that in itself can be damaging to the baby (your BP rising), and it may also be the cause of the head aches.

I just wanted to say that also, lumbar punctures do not extract fluid from the brain. They are done in your lower spine and they take out a small amount of fluid that will have originated from your brain. From this they can assess if there is any sign of infection/ inflammation there but that procedure in itself (if done in the right circumstances) shouldn't affect your brain at all and as well as that they may give you local anaesthetic arond where they introduce the needle into your spine but nothing else. It s not a procedure where you would usually need a full general anaesthetic and this would also be discouraged further in someone who is pregnant. A lumbar puncture is 'similar' to having an epidural except it doesn't cause the pain relief that does and it takes fluid out of one space rather than injecting meds into another area around the spinal cord.

Right, that is all I can say with regards to the thread. Really other than that you really do need to speak to a doctor as no one can give you advice without knowing your specific case and what the doctors have said etc etc and it could cause you (and the site) more problems if they did. Because of this and it being against the rules of the FAF, I am going to now close this thread.

If you want to discuss this decision in more detail then feel free to PM me,
KimA