Placenta Power!

I find the placenta completely fascinating and previous to being pregnant, I didn’t know anything about it. I was so surprised that this was a separate entity to the baby and a temporary organ grown by women in pregnancy. After my birth, I took my placenta home and studied it, photographed it and recently printed out an image to hang in the Mac gallery at an epic 4 metres by 2 metres on silk fabric. I wanted to showcase this epic, meaty organ that sustained us all- which gets very little credit, often discarded or referred to as ‘after birth’ as if it is an afterthought.

This artwork hung in the main gallery of the Mac for 3 months and was seen by hundreds of people, on the closing of the exhibition I gave a ‘Placenta power’ talk in front of this artwork to educate and inspire the audience on this “OG parent”- A term I heard coined in a podcast, by a physician scientist Harvey Kilman who studies placentas at Yale University.

What is a placenta?

A fully developed placenta is made up of a large mass of blood vessels from mother and baby- these blood vessels are close together but separated by tiny spaces. This allows both mother and baby to exchange substances across the capillary walls without the blood actually mixing.

The fetus is connected to the placenta through the umbilical cord, a tube with two arteries and a vein. Blood from the fetus enters the placenta through the umbilical arteries, exchanges gases and other substances with the mother’s blood, and travels back to the fetus through the umbilical vein.

‘Everybody’s got one’

https://radiolab.org/podcast/everybodys-got-one

This podcast is so entertaining and really gives such a good breakdown of the role of the placenta,

Main things I took away from this were- the idea that the embryo is not welcome in the mother’s body as it is a foreign object- because genetically it is not just her tissue, it is a bit of her and a bit of the father. The placenta creates an invisibility cloak to hide the embryo from the mother and when the placenta needs more blood supply, it has to breakthrough into the bloodstream to gain more blood.

Another online source i found on this surprising discovery of the ‘cloak’ was this:

https://archive.reading.ac.uk/news-events/2007/November/pr9938.html

“The placenta uses a cloaking device similar to that used by parasites to avoid detection by the mother's immune system” - Professor Phil Lowry

https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/engineering/placental-membrane

There are several complications that can affect the placenta during pregnancy or childbirth, which can be dangerous for both the mother and baby:

Placenta previa

Also known as a low-lying placenta, this occurs when the placenta partially or completely covers the cervix.

Placenta accreta
This happens when the placenta attaches too deeply to the uterine wall, and can cause serious blood loss during delivery.
Placental abruption
This occurs when the placenta separates from the uterine wall too early, which can lead to heavy bleeding and even death for the mother and baby.
Placental insufficiency
This occurs when the placenta doesn't provide enough nutrients or oxygen to the baby, which can lead to slower growth and reduced fetal movements.
Retained placenta
This occurs when part of the placenta remains in the uterus after giving birth, which can cause delayed bleeding, blood clots, fever, chills, and nausea.
Preeclampsia
This is a pregnancy complication that can lead to high blood pressure, kidney damage, and symptoms like weight gain, swelling, and headaches. This is the number one leading cause of maternal death.

An article in the Guardian states: “For while preeclampsia affects up to 6% of all pregnancies and causes approximately 500,000 foetal deaths and 70,000 maternal deaths worldwide each year, mostly in low- and middle-income nations, our understanding of why preeclampsia occurs, and how to treat it, is still rudimentary.”

A lot of the sources I read about preeclampsia spoke of the same idea of the placenta requiring so much blood which puts so much pressure on the pregnant body- which spikes the blood pressure to an unnatural level. The placenta is continuing the signal that it’s thirsty. A normal term placenta is around 1.5 pounds and after labour, the uterine muscle contracts and that motion helps to shear the placenta off the lining of the uterus.

It is remarkable to me that after all the hard work of breaking into the mother’s blood and accessing her blood vessels over months just close down magically and the fountain of blood that was migrating into the bloodstream just closes off. The placenta leaves no scar, no mark remains. I love how the podcast ends by saying the placenta is like the OG parent for the baby. It wants to meet all of the babies' needs in the most selfless way.

“Placenta health is human health” was a term I heard in the human placenta webinar (link below) and I love the idea that this organ women have grown since the beginning of time has much more knowledge to offer us. It seems the advancements in research are proving that some placental cells may be beneficial to help with auto-immune disorders and heart conditions. The more we understand this organ, the more we can improve the future lives of mothers and babies.

Research links below

Placenta research article

https://www.wrh.ox.ac.uk/news/revolutionary-ai-technology-reveals-new-insights-into-placental-health

Additional reading on pre-eclampsia