Dec 7

“Oh, I’ve Never Heard Of That?”

“Oh, I’ve never heard of that.” – OB/Gyn to mother who asked about the decreased efficiency of the Pill for overweight women.

28 people dislike these words.

There are 18 comments to this post.

steph had this to say, Dec 7, 2011 @ 10:20 am (Quote)

Well…at least the OB admitted to not knowing…

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Brittany had this to say, Dec 7, 2011 @ 10:42 am (Quote)

I have never heard of that either….I am 300 lbs and It has not failed me yet! But the moment I stopped I got pregnant with my Daughter. I bet my Dr never said anything because he never treated me any different because of my weight. I even asked him if I should be worried about diabetes, c sections or preclampsia because of my weight and he just laughed and was not worried at all. Love him.

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Diana Chastain had this to say, Dec 7, 2011 @ 10:49 am (Quote)

Seriously? I thought that was common knowledge. It’s worse with the patch. It’s best if overweight (like me) to use a back up form of birth control. We just use the withdrawal method. lol Hubby knows what he’s doing worked with our first. Once we wanted to start trying we were fortunate enough to get preggo right away.

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Brittany S Reply:
December 7th, 2011 at 10:57 am Brittany S(Quote)

Its good to know! I have been on B/C for 5+ years and I am very overweight, so far I have never even had a pregnancy scare other then when I stopped to get pregnant (not a scare though haha). Thanks! ^_^

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Nica had this to say, Dec 7, 2011 @ 10:54 am (Quote)

Never heard of this either until today… In fact, when I was doing my fertility treatments I flat out asked the RE if my being overweight would require a higher dosage of the stim meds to get results and he said that weight had nothing to do with it. (I look at this as kind of related since both these meds affect the ovaries, though in VERY different ways and you do go on BCP when you start fertility meds to shut down the ovaries before treatment). Given that I got pregnant twice with this doc’s help, I think he knows what he’s talking about!

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Diana had this to say, Dec 7, 2011 @ 11:08 am (Quote)

Sometimes it is hard for women who are over weight to conceive at all. But sometimes not. It’s all a guessing game sometimes. Better to be safe than sorry if you don’t want to get pregnant.

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Nicole had this to say, Dec 7, 2011 @ 11:12 am (Quote)

The decreased effectiveness is not dramatic… a couple of percentage points.

But this doc should have known

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Kate, Ren's mama had this to say, Dec 7, 2011 @ 11:16 am (Quote)

Wow, I didn’t know this either! I guess I’m lucky, because I was on BC for years before I was ready to have kids, and I’m very overweight. Also apparently very fertile, since DH and I have tried a total of 3 cycles and we have 2 kids

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Layla19 had this to say, Dec 7, 2011 @ 11:40 am (Quote)

This is me.

Nope, Nicole, it’s not dramatic- I’ve since found out it’s still somewhere over 90% effective. However, I’ve been reading for over a decade that the pill is less effective if you’re over 150 lbs, so the fact that this doctor- who presumably went to medical school- had never heard it, was a little unnerving.

Dropping to 90% effectiveness isn’t terrible- but when you absolutely cannot have a baby right now (and cannot give up for adoption, and would not get an abortion), that chance you’ll get pregnant on birth control is a little high.

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Details Reply:
December 7th, 2011 at 1:06 pm Details(Quote)

Wait a minute 150 lbs on a 5 ft woman or a 6 ft woman? One is seriously overweight and the other is a bit underweight. I don’t know that I would say it was patently false or that every woman should take exactly the same dose. But I would want to read the study myself. It seems they should be using some form of BMI or some type of weight chart to at least look at the height vs. weight variables. In other words we all aren’t 5’6″.

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Skyfire Reply:
December 7th, 2011 at 1:45 pm Skyfire(Quote)

Medication doesn’t really care how tall you are. It’s not discriminating against fat people. If you have more mass, if there is more of you, often you require more medication to be effective, no matter how that mass is distributed.

Two people with the same BMI may require different amounts of medication, if one is more massive.

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Layla19 Reply:
December 7th, 2011 at 3:10 pm Layla19(Quote)

Here’s one:

http://www.physorg.com/news166795862.html

And here’s a little thing reacting to one of the studies, although the link to the story from that page no longer works:

http://www.bigfatblog.com/node/239

I originally read it in the warnings, in my very first pack of pills ever. And- one shot of Scotch would be less effective on a person over 150 pounds. One sandwich wouldn’t feed a person over 150 pounds as long (in general, of course, each individual is different). But total mass would make more of a difference than height.

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lilmrsmchenry had this to say, Dec 7, 2011 @ 11:59 am (Quote)

In my opinion, more meds should be prescribed to adults based on Body Surface Area in the same way that children are. It makes sense that the same dose of medication will not work the same way in a 95 lb woman and a 350 lb woman. Common sense says that the body will not distribute it in the same way.
I do remember the study mentioned though, I believe it was conducted by Victoria Holt.

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Ethel had this to say, Dec 7, 2011 @ 12:43 pm (Quote)

Actually it is just as effective for obese women as the rest of the world, but it simply takes the full first month of use for it to be effective. Patently false to say it drops to 90% folks! Same amount for everyone, just use a back up method that first month (as you should anyway).

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Layla19 Reply:
December 7th, 2011 at 3:16 pm Layla19(Quote)

I’m not sure there have even been enough good studies to call it patently false.

I’d also want to see a study that takes into account the link between higher weights and infertility… after all, a study on birth control done solely on women without uteri would be useless… if the study does not take into account overweight/obese women’s lessened fertility (as a group, not any individual) then you wouldn’t be getting an accurate assessment of the medication.

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