Psychatric Impact of Miscarriage in Assiut University Hospital

Miscarriage is basically defined as intrauterine fetal death before viability (1,2). Age of viability, in Egypt, sets at 26 weeks of gestation (3). Incidence of miscarriage is often referred to as an iceberg where the actual size of the problem cannot be determined. More than 50% of human conceptions are lost before the missed period either before or after implantation (4). In clinically recognized pregnancies, losses decrease as pregnancy progresses from 17% - 20 % after 6 weeks to only 3% at 10 weeks gestation (4). Beside the high incidence of miscarriage, it implies a high psychological morbidity to both partners with increased liability to anxiety, post stress disorder and depression(5,6). This psychological impact can be attributed not only to loss of desired child but also to the traumatic event of bleeding and pain encountered by those patients (7).