Having ketones in urine during pregnancy is a problem that a lot of women are faced with. You shouldn’t get too worried because it isn’t a serious complication.
Nonetheless it could become alarming at some point. The ketones are substances originating from the breakdown of fat that the body uses to produce energy if there is an emergency such as glucose deficiency or starvation.
All in all ketones are formed when the body has to use the fat reserves that it has to produce energy.
The process
The body gets the energy from the food consumed. This gets converted into blood sugar and glucose. The access to blood sugar is gained through insulin.
If you are faced with having ketones in urine while being pregnant you should know that the pregnancy hormones increase the resistance of the body against insulin.
This means that the body’s cells don’t get enough glucose from the blood. As a result pregnant women don’t have enough energy. The body tries to find some alternative energy sources, such as the fat reserves. A by-product of this process is ketone.
Causes
There are different factors that could lead to the presence of ketones in the urine, including bad diet and dehydration. It is also possible that you don’t get enough calories from your diet or the intervals between meals are too long.
Another possibility is that you are skipping snacks or meals or that you are affected by gestational diabetes during pregnancy.
The natural symptoms of pregnancy, like poor eating habits, nausea and throwing up could also result in ketones in pregnant women’s urine.
As it has been mentioned before, the hormones also have a role to play, especially the ones that increase the resistance of the body to insulin, thus restricting access of the body to the available blood sugar.
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