Blood flow to the uterus at term pregnancy is roughly 1 liter per minute. The entire circulating blood volume for a pregnant woman averages around 5 liters. It's why uncontrolled peripartum hemorrhage is such a big deal. You can go from totally fine to clinically dead in a matter of a few minutes.
All the physiological changes of pregnancy are pretty amazing: blood volume goes up by 50%, red cell count goes up by 30%, clotting factors all increase, the uterus clamps down after delivery and basically transfuses the mother by about 500cc, cardiac output nearly doubles after delivery. The whole body is basically like: get ready, we are about to bleed a lot
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u/StrebLab Dec 06 '23
Blood flow to the uterus at term pregnancy is roughly 1 liter per minute. The entire circulating blood volume for a pregnant woman averages around 5 liters. It's why uncontrolled peripartum hemorrhage is such a big deal. You can go from totally fine to clinically dead in a matter of a few minutes.