When thinking about bladder infection during pregnancy, you should know that it doesn’t happen more often in pregnant women than in other women, but it is more dangerous.
If women are affected during the third trimester of pregnancy, the baby could be affected by mental retardation or developmental delay.
Information about pregnancy bladder infection
In case of pregnancy, there are a lot of changes that happen to the urinary tract and these could make contracting a bladder infection easier. These changes include anatomical changes caused by the growing uterus, like the enlargement of the kidney or the compression of the bladder or urethra.
Regarding pregnancy bladder infection you should also consider the functional changes, like the bladder not emptying completely, the urine not being acidic enough or the urine containing too much protein, sugar and hormones.
Antibiotic treatments
Septra and Bactrim
Since the bladder infection during pregnancy is quite common, doctors usually prescribe antibiotics to treat it. The majority of these medication work in case of infections of this kind.
Nonetheless it looks like the doctors have certain favorites when it comes to pregnant women.
These are brand names referring to antibiotics used to treat pregnancy bladder infection. They both come with sulfamethoxazole and trimethoprim. These are meant to stop the production of folic acid that supports the survival of the bacteria. They are pretty much safe for humans, but lethal for the bacteria.
There are also some downsides regarding these antibiotics for bladder infection during pregnancy. They are known for causing allergies and rash in many cases. Often people have allergies that are so serious that threaten their life. Also it could have some effects to the other organs as well, such as the kidney.
In case of pregnancy bladder infection, these antibiotics could lead to urine crystals that cause urinary obstruction, bleeding or even kidney damage. It is also possible for the antibiotics to disrupt the bacteria of the intestines and they can upset the stomach.
Macrodantin and Keflex
These are alternatives for treating bladder infection during pregnancy. Their advantage is that they can be used for long term to prevent the infection or as active treatment to treat the problem.
They seem to be more effective and safer than the other antibiotics, but they also have their downsides.
Macrobid and Cipro
Usually when it comes to pregnancy bladder infection, the doctors tend to prescribe newer and also more expensive antibiotics. The good thing about Macrobid is that it has few negative effects on the intestines and the drug gets concentrated in the bladder where it should act.
This trend regarding the different kinds of treatments of the infection may be created by doctors because they think that the new antibiotics work better than the old ones but this isn’t a must. The antibiotics are prescribed by doctors according to the medical specialty that they have.
In case of bladder infection during pregnancy, internists usually prescribe Cipro while the obstetricians usually suggest Macrobid so this is what you can expect if you get affected.
