What Doctors Want You To Know: 10 Tips To Get Pregnant Quickly
When trying to get pregnant, there is a lot to look forward to. Feeling the notorious biological clock tick away, getting pregnant can become daunting. Although it might happen quickly, it could take longer than expected, even when you and your partner are healthy.
Experts recommend that healthy couples who want to conceive try for a year if you are younger than 35, and 6 months if you are 35 or older.
Thankfully, there are easy steps you can follow to speed along conception, however long you’ve been trying.
1. Get Pre-conception Counseling:
About 2 t0 3 months before you are ready to start trying, make an appointment with your ob-gyn.
“He or she will discuss your reproductive goals, screen you for conditions such as anemia that might need treatment, and consider less toxic alternatives to any prescription or over-the-counter medications you take,”
says Kelly Pagidas, M.D., a fertility specialist with Women & Infants Center for Reproduction and Infertility in Providence, and an associate professor at Brown University Medical School.
Clearing up any issues upfront can prevent delays down the road when your fertility is declining due to diminished quality and quantity of eggs.
2. Update Your Annual Exams:
In addition to your cervical screening test, and regular physical exams, be sure to check and be treated for any underlying infections.
Certain infections may not be treatable while you’re pregnant and could result in reproductive delays, some people believe that gum disease may cause more complications later in pregnancy
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3. Get Vaccinated:
Make sure all your vaccine shots are updated, particularly those for measles, chicken pox, and flu, before you try to get pregnant. You’re at higher risk of complications if you get sick during pregnancy, and some vaccines are not safe during pregnancy.
4. Check Your Thyroid Levels:
“We’re seeing increasing numbers of women whose thyroid is very subtly under-functioning,”
says Jani Jensen, M.D., a reproductive endocrinologist and assistant professor at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota.
“A slight dysfunction could lead to difficulty becoming pregnant or miscarriage.”
But many doctors don’t test your thyroid hormone levels during your hormonal profiling exams, you and your doctor may need to be extra vigilant.
5. Have Your Man Checked Out Too:
“It makes sense to do a basic semen analysis on men when you start trying,”
says Alan Copperman, M.D., director of Reproductive Medicine Associates of New York and co-director of the Division of Reproductive Endocrinology and Infertility at The Mount Sinai Hospital in New York City.
Male infertility accounts for 40-50% of infertility cases, male infertility is commonly due to deficiencies in semen, and semen quality affecting approximately 7% of all men.
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6. Consider using an ovulation predictor kit:
Doctors used to rely on basal body temperature to predict ovulation. It only tells you once you’ve already ovulated, which is too late, plus taking your temperature daily can be stressful.
An ovulation predictor kit is now the recommended method. It monitors the levels of luteinizing hormone (LH) and helps couples with busy schedules stay on top of their fertility. Once it turns positive, you want to have sex in the next 24 to 36 hours.
7. Careful With Vaginal Lubricants:
Vaginal lubricant safety is a major international public health concern, many commonly used water-based lubricants can inhibit sperm movement by 60 percent. You should ask your health care provider to recommend a favourable one to you.
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8. Switch up your coital positions:
Some research suggests that missionary is best for being impregnated, but the data is not conclusive. There’s no doubt that some positions are more comfortable, you should do what feels right for you so that you are more likely to keep up a consistent routine.
There isn’t much evidence to suggest that there’s much benefit from elevating your legs afterward.
It does not make one bit of difference in conception, accordingly to Dr. Jensen
9. Don’t feel you have to abstain from sex:
You may have been advised to wait a few days between intercourse with your man because men need time to build up enough sperm. “That’s not true,” says David Ryley, M.D., a reproductive endocrinologist at Boston IVF fertility clinic and clinical instructor at Harvard Medical School.
“Ejaculation effects seminal volume, not the concentration of sperm. The concentration is more important and not influenced by the frequency of sex.”
10. Keep an eye on your weight:
Being too far on either side of a healthy body mass index can affect the health of your eggs and result in pregnancy complications.
Women with excess weight are particularly challenged because they may not ovulate regularly, which definitely slow down the chances of getting pregnant.can render a woman more infertile.
There are definitely other ways to speed up your conception, you should listen to your body and be proactive with your general and reproductive health when you visit your doctor or when you are away from the hospital.