What is prenatal care?

Prenatal care is also called antenatal care. This covers all the extra care that you receive during your pregnancy in preparation for your baby’s birth.

Prenatal care is not only about medicine and about tests. It includes counselling and providing information like this guide. It also includes advice on your general health such as taking exercise and stopping smoking.

As with all aspects of HIV care, it is very important that members of your healthcare team have had specialist experience with HIV positive women. This includes your obstetrician, midwife, paediatrician and other support staff.

It is also important that the people responsible for providing your care understand the most recent developments in preventing mother-to-child transmission and in HIV care.

Does every HIV positive woman need to use treatment in pregnancy?

Every pregnant woman with HIV with a CD4 count of about 350 cells/mm3 or less needs to start treatment for her own health.

Women will also consider a short course of treatment during pregnancy, to prevent mother-to-child transmission. This is regardless of the mother’s CD4 or viral load counts.

Treatment recommendations for pregnant women can be slightly different than those for other HIV positive adults.

Usually it is best once you start HIV treatment, to continue for the rest of your life. In pregnancy people often use treatment just until delivery, then they stop.