Pregnancy can be cruel. Just when you are at your most swollen, bloated, and exhausted, sleep proves frustratingly elusive. Every night, you toss and turn, trying to find a comfortable position, your back aching, and your belly pressing down on your bladder. And then, as you finally start to drift off, you realize you need to pee.
To make matters worse, despite having an enormous bowling ball attached to your stomach, you are told you cannot sleep on your back:
“After 16 weeks of pregnancy, experts advise women to not sleep on their backs, but rather should lie on their sides, ideally the left side” states a popular pregnancy blog.
But who came up with this idea?
This advice stems three studies that have linked back sleeping with late stillbirth (pregnancy loss after 28 weeks). (Interestingly these warnings predated the three studies, so they are not exactly the reason women are told to avoid back sleeping)
I described the first two studies, one conducted in Ghana, the other in New Zealand, in an earlier post, and concluded that not only did they provide no reason for alarm, they certainly do not justify blanket advice again back sleeping.
In 2015, a third study came out linking back sleeping with late stillbirth. Does it change the overall picture?
Continue reading “Back Sleeping During Pregnancy and the Sydney Stillbirth Study”