Women's health with Dr Rasheedah

This week’s topic is another rarely talked about  but important topic in early pregnancy. If you’re a medical doctor and a woman of child bearing age comes to you complaining of excruciating abdominal pain plus or minus bleeding you are programmed to think Ectopic pregnancy until proven otherwise.. Yes in most cases it is overkill but ectopic pregnancies could have fatal consequences when not managed properly. Apologies if the undertone of this post appears scary but It is important to maintain balance with creating awareness and whilst ectopic pregnancies are not as common as miscarriages, they remain a significant cause of maternal mortality and morbidity in Sub Saharan Africa.It occurs in 1 in 80 pregnancies worldwide so worth speaking about. Let’s recap, pregnancy begins when the egg is fertilized by a sperm most likely in the fallopian tube and this egg travels down and implants in the lining of the womb, an ectopic pregnancy occurs when the fertilised egg implants elsewh