'I became obsessed with placentas when no one could tell me what went wrong with mine.' Researchers are discovering that placentas hold the key to treating devastating conditions
Photo-Illustration: Getty Images Last year, after the birth of my son, I spent ten days in the hospital under siege. My blood pressure had skyrocketed and wouldn’t come down, putting me in imminent danger of having a stroke. A catheter, not my newborn, was planted in my arms, pumping me with magnesium sulfate to protect my brain from high blood pressure–induced seizures. When the doctors finally sent me home, they urged me to stay vigilant. You’re not out of the woods yet they said.
Pre-eclampsia rates have soared by 25 percent in the last two decades, according to the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, while maternal mortality has doubled in the same period, earning the U.S. the highest numbers in the developed world. In the hospital, I asked the doctors and nurses caring for me for an explanation. My pregnancy was normal, and I was healthy. Why was this happening? Their responses were vague: “It’s something with your placenta.” “It’s not well understood.
A placenta made life possible for every person on the planet but for a long time it was tucked away in a corner of medicine in the “niche” of women’s health. Western scientists once characterized this temporary organ as little more than a passive conduit for the shuttling of nutrients from mother to fetus. But many cultures, recognizing something more complex and mysterious at work, have imbued the placenta with special meaning, choosing to honor it, not forget.
In pregnancy, it’s usually quiet in the beginning and busy at the end. Women with access to prenatal care see a doctor, nurse practitioner, or midwife near the end of the first trimester and then once a month until the due date approaches, when visits become more frequent. But what if pregnancies at risk for adverse outcomes could be identified in the beginning?
But is placentophagy really traditional? I’m a historian, so any claims to age-old medicine put my skepticism radar on full blast. I already knew that OBs are adamantly against the practice and that the CDC has warned of the potential for serious illness in newborns, in particular, strep B infection. Then I found Sabine Wilms, a scholar of traditional Chinese medicine who spent years studying what classical Chinese texts have to say about gynecology and postpartum recovery.
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