Mifepristone for miscarriage treatment is a new option for women. Medical management of a miscarriage is the middle ground between waiting for nature to take its course, and waiting for a procedure appointment at the doctor’s office or in the hospital. Some women don’t want to wait for the pregnancy to pass on its own. “Waiting it out” is the least invasive treatment, but might take the longest amount of time. It’s also the most unpredictable path, and you don’t know when the miscarriage is going to start. Other people are hesitant to undergo surgery. With a procedure, you know exactly when the miscarriage is going to happen, but it carries the risks of surgery.
For people who want to avoid a procedure and who don’t want to do nothing, medication management is an ideal choice. Using medication essentially kickstarts the natural process of your body passing the pregnancy tissue. Doctors can do this when your body has determined that the pregnancy has stopped growing, but it has not yet begun to leave your body.
medications to treat miscarriage
Until 2018, doctors used a single medication to manage a miscarriage, called misoprostol. This medication comes in pill form, and most commonly 4 pills are used at a time. These pills are either placed in your vagina or in your cheeks. Misoprostol alone is moderately effective at causing your body to miscarry. But recent research has shown us that women who receive a medication called mifepristone before they take misoprostol have a higher success rate of treatment for their miscarriage. This means a lower chance of needing a surgical procedure to complete the miscarriage. But not all doctors’ offices and hospitals have mifepristone available to give patients. And it’s not a medication that you can get by prescription. If your doctor doesn’t mention mife, you can ask if that’s an option for you.
If you Google these medications, you may see that they are also used as the regimen for a medication abortion. Just to be clear: It doesn’t mean that you’re having an abortion if you’re given these medications. Your doctor is not trying to fool you about your diagnosis. Mifepristone and misoprostol are medications that are used for both clinical situations—women who are having an abortion and women who are having a miscarriage.
If your doctor does use mife as part of their treatment for miscarriage, this will be the first medication they give you. You will often take this medication on the same day that you’re fully counseled about your options for managing your miscarriage, and once you decide to proceed with medical management. The dose of mife is 200 mg in a single tablet that you’ll swallow in front of the doctor.
how mifepristone makes you feel
Many people don’t feel any side effects from mifepristone. They may have light spotting in the day or two after. Heavier bleeding is relatively uncommon, but may occur if you were on the edge of miscarrying naturally.
Even if you do start bleeding like a period after taking mifepristone, it’s important that you take the misoprostol tablets as well, as directed by your doctor.
I find that women who want to take action to finish their miscarriage, but still want it to feel “natural” if possible, do very well with taking mifepristone for miscarriage treatment. If your doctor doesn’t offer it to you, ask if they can refer you to a provider who can (like at a Planned Parenthood).
