Sleeping on Back During Pregnancy May Induce Stillbirth

Sleeping positions during pregnancy plays an important role in ensuring a safe and trouble-free pregnancy.

Highlighting this point, a team of researchers from Australia found sleeping on back after conceiving a child increases the risks of miscarriage and stillbirth.

A stillbirth is the death of a fetus inside the uterus after 20 weeks of pregnancy.  According to the still born still loved organization, every year nearly three million babies are stillborn across the world and 28,000 in the Unites States.

The five-year study known as the Sydney Stillbirth Study included 295 pregnant women (most of them more than 32 weeks pregnant) visiting eight hospitals across Australia.

Dr. Adrienne Gordon from Sydney's Royal Prince Alfred Hospital and colleagues found sleeping on back for a long period affecting the blood flow to the baby and increasing the risks of stillbirth by six times.

"It's in this later stage of pregnancy that the largest proportion of stillbirths occur," Emma McLeod, director of the Stillbirth Foundation Australia, which funded Dr Gordon's work told MSN Health News.

"For around 40 per cent of stillbirths after 32 weeks, they are otherwise perfectly healthy babies and there is no medical explanation as to why they died."

Apart from the sleeping position, the study also helped to point out other risk factors of stillbirth like fetal movement and growth of babies or small size.

"We found an association with decreased movements and stillborn babies," Daily Mail quoted Gordon, as saying.

However, the experts emphasize the need for further studies to re-confirm the findings.

"It's also important that women who are currently pregnant don't become alarmed if they sometimes sleep on their back," McLeod told MSN. "We need to further improve how pregnancy is managed when a baby is identified as small during gestation, especially now we know how significant this is."

According to health experts from the American Pregnancy Association, sleep on side or SOS is the best sleeping position during pregnancy.  

However, they specify sleeping on the left side as it helps the mother to increase the blood flow to the baby and increase the amount of the nutrients the baby gets.