32 - Successful live birth after three miscarriages

 Overview
Between the years of 2005 and 2007, patient became pregnant three times, but unfortunately miscarried each one by the eighth week. This woman was hopeful that a new perspective and outlook would be offered to her that would help explain her recurrent miscarriages.

Western Diagnosis- No formal western diagnosis was offered other than evidence of anitphospholipid antibodies (APA), in the upper limits of normal, and a bi-cornate uterus that was evaluated and found to be non-problematic. Even though the APA was found to be within normal ranges, she was still prescribed low dose aspirin and told to keep trying. She was also diagnosed with mild MS.

Her husband had one of his testicles removed because of previous cancer, no radiation or chemotherapy was needed, and his remaining testicle seemed to be producing normal and healthy amounts of sperm.

Present signs and symptoms- Recurrent pregnancy loss. Widespread facial acne. Menses that are normally delayed at 34 days a cycle, with a flow that is dark red, clotted, and painful. Emotionally she found herself to be irritable, frustrated, and depressed.

Chinese Medicine Diagnosis- In Chinese medicine, common causes of recurrent miscarriage are due to Kidney weakness, heat in the blood, and blood stasis. To differentiate which pattern may be most responsible for this woman's pregnancy losses I needed to look at all the signs and symptoms that she was manifesting.

I decided that since this woman was a fairly robust looking individual, that kidney weakness was not her main pattern, and that blood heat and stasis were most likely the problem, as evident by her acne, delayed and painful menstrual cycles. In Chinese medicine this would be considered as a disharmony between the chong and the ren channels. Her treatment principles were then to course the liver, rectify the Qi, cool and invigorate the blood, clear fire toxin, and harmonize the chong and ren. Because her acne was so widespread and her face was very greasy, I concluded that before invigorating her blood too strongly that I was best off resolving the fire toxin first, as it was quite likely that the intensity of the heat from this fire toxin was congealing her blood, resulting in the blood stasis.

 Treatment
Along with weekly acupuncture visits this woman drank a daily decoction of granulated herbal tea.

 Outcome
After 5 months of treatment: Acne cleared by about 90 percent. Menstrual cycles became regular at 29 days, without any menstrual pain. Most importantly this woman became pregnant, delivering a healthy boy a week before full term.

Trevor Erikson