“Can pregnant women drink coffee?” is one of the many questions women who love coffee ask when they are planning to get pregnant or discover they are pregnant.
We don’t claim to be experts in this field and we are not in the medical profession. However here are a few studies found on the web, which may be helpful to you if you or your partner is pregnant.
Baby Center recommended just one small cup of coffee (caffeine) per day and you should avoid multiple sources of caffeine including energy drinks. The article quoted a new study done in San Francisco of 1,000 women in their first trimester where miscarriages doubled when they drank 200 mg (2 small cups) of caffeine per day. Those who drank just 100 mg per day had a 15 percent rate of miscarriage and those who omitted caffeine had a rate of 12 percent.
In an article by Dr. Mercola on “Why Therapeutic Benefits of Coffee do not Apply to Pregnant Women” he quoted a Norwegian study on 60,000 women. The study showed that coffee and other caffeinated beverages increases the chance of delivering a low birth weight baby and or extended gestation period.
Quoting directly from the article:
Every 100 mg of caffeine consumed by the mother per day equated to a nearly one ounce reduction in the baby’s weight at birth.
So moms-to-be, is your coffee drinking habit over or on hold for the next 9 months?
According to Parents magazine “no one is completely sure!”
Their article on “Can you Drink Coffee when Pregnant?” has an interesting argument. They quoted an opinion given by an ob-gyn from Nantucket Cottage Hospital in Massachusetts. David Elmer, M.D., said, “Most of the evidence comes from retrospective studies.”
Why did he say that?
“It isn’t ethical to give 1,000 pregnant women an unknown drug and see how many have complications…” He continued saying (quoted from the article), “The overwhelming evidence is that it really isn’t as bad as we think.”
This article continued with some interesting facts, which we feel coffee lovers may be happy to read:
One highly caffeinated mom-to-be who drank no fewer than six cups of coffee per day, sometimes up to 24 in a single day. “She carried the pregnancy uneventfully, with NO birth defects or changes in growth, but she did end up going into premature labor…it’s hard to know for sure if caffeine caused it.
The reason behind Dr. Elmer’s “it’s hard to know for sure if caffeine caused it” is because you have to look at the entire lifestyle of the mom-to-be. A person that smokes, have a medical history and or works in a high-stress environment may give different results.
Parents magazine provides many helpful resources on pregnancy and parenting including the Top 7 Causes of Miscarriage. Read it here. And by the way, coffee-drinking was not one of the causes.
An article by WebMD 10 Pregnancy Health Myths Exposed said you can enjoy a brew but you must limit to 200mg a day of caffeine (including tea, chocolate and cola). That is an equivalent of 2 mugs of instant coffee.
Notice the words instant coffee?
Instant coffee has lower caffeine compared to brewed coffee and espresso. Here are the findings of caffeine content in the various types of coffee from Mayo Clinic.
8 oz. of Instant coffee contains 27-173 mg caffeine
8 oz. of brewed coffee contains 95-200 mg caffeine
1 oz. of restaurant-style espresso contains 47-75 mg caffeine (note: this is 1 oz.)
8 oz. of latte, mocha, other specialty coffee drinks contains 63-175 mg caffeine
Looking at the above numbers from Mayo Clinic we think there is not a lot of difference between instant coffee and specialty coffee drinks.
Finally, we took a look at a study by Harvard School of Public Health. Their answer to “What is the latest research on the risks of coffee or caffeine during pregnancy?”:
“The jury is still out…but we know that the caffeine goes through the placenta and reaches the fetus, and that the fetus is very sensitive to caffeine…so for pregnant women…reduce coffee consumption to a low level…one cup a day!”
That’s what one of our writers did when she was pregnant with her second baby. She totally went cold turkey with her first baby, going without coffee for nine months. With her second baby she drank one cup a day. Both babies were born healthy and normal.
Note: Everyone is different. Your health depends on many factors including your lifestyle and home and work environment. Please check with your doctors before making your decision to drink coffee while pregnant.
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