Hi
I am forum jumping here but not much going on in my forum so I am poking around for something fun to talk about! (due in Oct) I also had this issue, and I decided against any prenatal shots since it's a)pretty random that you will become sensitized then, I mean why not give you shots every 12 weeks then through the pregnancy? b) it's a blood product. it has given people hepatitis in the past. it could pass on diseases we don't even know about yet. if you google rhogam the lawyers are all over it hoping for their class action lawsuit lol c) I am not in love with medical interventions or shot happy doctors. d)it is not tested prenatally (says so on insert packaging) and though I don't remember 100% it may even be not recommended for prenatal use?
There is some speculation that it contributes to issues in baby- but this is all speculation at this point. I read somewhere in my "research" while making my decision that a far greater majority of children with autism are born to mothers who are RH negative (thus likely had the shot prenatally). There were also some other possible links but of course it was all speculation. But a lot of it seemed plausible to me.
The actual numbers in the chances of getting sensitized are so incredibly low, and the shot is not always going to work. There are many cases of babies with RH sydrome when mothers had the shots. The disease can also in a majority of cases be (cured?) helped. And your baby may be born negative anyways (mine was). I had decided that I would consider getting the shot after baby came if baby was positive. I didn't even have to do it!
Here's one thread on Mothering that I like (lots of food for thought, both sides):
http://www.mothering.com/community/t/1112562/rhogam
This link is one woman's thoughts:
http://www.vegfamily.com/vegan-pregnancy/prenatal-rhogam.htm
this following quote came from I have no idea where, probably a forum somewhere (maybe even in mothering), I had it stashed away in an email, I thought it was quite interesting and seemed to make sense. So my apologies to whomever I am stealing it from!
"I don't understand why pregnant women have the jab when they are pregnant.
They have the jab because they are told if they have antibodies in the blood from a previous pregnancy that will damage the baby?
Well, keep in mind a very important point about RhoGam and that is that the antibodies attack ALL RH positive cells. The entire premise is that if the mother's blood mixes with the baby's blood, the antibodies will neutralize the baby's blood cells before the mother can create her own antibodies against the baby. The dilemna is that if the mother's and baby's blood does actually mix it is equally likely that the RhoGam antibodies will cross over and attack the baby itself. This happens frequently but isn't discussed by most doctors. It is a big reason to only get the shot after pregancy if the baby really is RH+
The RhoGam antibodies will attach to your baby's blood cells and render them incapable of delivering oxygen. This has long term consequences on brain development. Most doctors are completely ignorant of this issue.
The RhoGam antibodies do not cross the placenta. But neither do blood cells from the baby which is exactly why the RhoGam is injected. In very rare circumstances, such as the mother becoming injured, the blood of the mother and baby can mix. It's a paradox, only when the antibodies are needed can they harm the baby.
The RhoGam antibodies are put there to attack any baby's blood that comes across. But if there is mixing then the antibodies can go across the other way and they do exactly that. Antibodies diffuse much more readily through the bloodstream than whole cells.
Immunology textbooks still correctly point out that RhoGam should be given after childbirth only if the baby is RH+. These are the mothers that are at high risk. However the company that manufactures RhoGam lobbied to have it's use expanded to all RH- mothers during and after pregnancy to 'guarantee' that all high risk mothers were protected. Doctors try to rationalize this by saying that even during the first pregnancy blood can mix and antibodies can be produced that will attack the baby. This almost never happens because the blood would have to mix twice, once to stimulate the production of Abs in the mother and the second time for those antibodies to diffuse to the baby. And regardless, the paradox comes into play because if the mother's Abs can diffuse to harm the baby, then so can the injected RhoGam Abs. They are the same exact antibodies.
Each RhoGam injected contains blood serum pooled from several different persons with the antibodies. The manufacturer can not possibly screen or remove all viruses from it. But that's a separate issue.
The Rhogam antibodies in the injection are identical to the antibodies that the Rh- mother makes against her child. The Rhogam antibodies were collected from RH- mothers who did have an immune response to their RH+ babies. The Rhogam antibodies will attack and destroy the baby's red blood cells (if they do come across the placenta) before the mother's immune response kicks in and makes her own antibodies. You give rhogam to a mother after delivery because that is when the blood mixes. The rhogam antibodies destroy the baby's cells so that the mother's immune system never sees them and therefore never becomes sensitized to make those exact same antibodies.
If you give the Rhogam antibodies during pregnancy you have just created the situation you were trying to avoid. The whole point is for the pregnant mother to NOT have antibodies against her own child circulating in her system while she is pregnant.
Any blood mixing would allow those antibodies to attack the baby.
It does not matter if the mother's immune system made those antibodies or another mother's immune system (rhogam) made those antibodies. They are identical down to their molecular structure and you do not want them to contact the baby."
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