Antibodies in blood?

starsjaime · January 2013

I just found out today they they discovered that i have antibodies in blood from my first pregnancy. Im getting more blood work tomorrow to find out more information....anyone had this before? What does this mean? Any knowledge is appreciated!

paigenicole23 · January 2013

hi! so just like you, they found antibodies in my blood (in my 8w initial bloodwork). mine is the anti-cw, which i guess is really really rare. my dr had never heard of it, so i was referred to a high-risk specialist. met with him last fri, he told me there is no test for the cw antigen (there are for other antibodies tho) so no way to test DH or my baby for it. everything looks great on my baby, but i will have an ultrasound every 2-4 weeks to make sure baby is not becoming anemic. from what i gathered, your body has been exposed to whatever your particular antibody is from prev baby and created antibodies against it. it will only come into play if your baby has the corresponding antigen (which baby could only get from you or baby's father). since your body is making the anibody, you do not have it so that leaves dad. if dad has it, baby should too and your antibody will recognize this "foreign object" as a threat and begin to split & multiply to attack. they will try to cross the placenta and attack baby, leaving baby at risk to become anemic. sounds scary, BUT it is hard for them to get to baby. so they typically monitor extra. I learned with what they are doing for me special ultrasound machines can measure the rate of bloodflow through baby's brain, faster=thicker & slower=thinner, and thinner blood means baby could potentially be anemic. hope this made sense and helps, if you have any more questions I am more than happy to try to help answer! good luck!

starsjaime · January 2013

Thanks for the info! The obgyn called me and spoke for like 5 minitues but i didn't really know what to say. I go back in for additional blood work tomorrow. So i should have more answers by end of week.

I did just have an ultrasound last week and she said that everything looked great with baby, so that is good. Just need to get through at least another 8 or so weeks....

They didn't detect this earlier because they missed some of my blood work. Ugh. She did say though that it was probably caused from my prior C-section with DD1

paigenicole23 · January 2013

i feel you on the initial shock when they call you with it! when my OB called he used the word "abnormal" and all i could say is im sorry what was that? i heard the words but that was the extent that I took out of the conversation. they will draw more blood and run a more thorough test to detect just what antibody you have and go from there. some are more commonly seen than others i guess! https://www.pathology.leedsth.nhs.uk/pathology/ClinicalInfo/AntenatalTesting/AntibodiesinPregnancy.aspx

may help, but trust me do not google it I freaked myself out with false info! with the more common antibodies, they will do bloodwork every 2-4 weeks to test the titer level, which gives a refernce point of where your antibody titer level is at initially and to see if it increases from there, meaning they are splitting and producing more antibodies.

amyjme85 · January 2013

I found out at about 25 weeks that I had antibodies in my blood with my second child. I had to get weekly blood draws to make sure the levels stayed safe. My doctor also wanted me to try and bank my own blood for a couple of weeks in case I hemorrhaged and needed it during delivery. On my first attempt to bank I fainted in the room so my doctor wouldn't let me continue. He told me that my biggest risk was not being able to receive blood that didn't have the same antibody. I would offer to bank some and let you have it, because I know how scary it is, but I am currently pregnant and my doc won't let me again. Everything turned out wonderful during my delivery...no hemorrhaging, no blood lost, perfectly healthy baby. One thing that I personally think helped was that I made myself walk a lot so that my body was strong...I also had a great epidural so my body was completely relaxed and I didn't fight and tear.

I hope this helps some.

NNGnome · January 2013

I was antibody sensitised during a blood transfusion before my first baby, throughout the pregnancy your titers will be measures (that's how many antibodies you currently have the lowest is less than 1:1, then it goes up from there, to 1:8, 1:16 then 1:32 etc, most doctorsaren't too worried unles it goes higher than 1:32 (although it does sepend on the antibody and the doctor).

Mine hovered around 1:8 - 1:16 until about 30ish weeks then it went up to 1:128, by 30 weeks I was having a u/s twice a week (once a week since 20 weeks), LO was fine until week 36 when his movement slowed and we had an emergency c-section. In the end he had to have an exchange transfusion (where they take his blood out and replace it with antibody free blood), and 3 blood transfusion and was in the NICU under UV lights for 10 days, but he is fine now, no long standing problems at all from the antibodies.

This is quite an exteme reaction, most might need a transfusion or be delivered early (even if there had been no problems my dr wanted to deliver at 38 weeks to be on the safe side) but can happen, with my current pregnancy as the reaction was bad last time, I will probably have to have at least 3 intrauterine blood transfusions, it is scary, and no-one wants to go through it, but as soon as the baby is out the antibodies die off, and there are no long lasting effects.

There is a link in my siggy to a community specifically for people with te sensitisation that is worth a look.

Antibodies in blood?

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