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1-Page Summary of Expecting Better
Overview
If you’re pregnant, it’s easy to be confused by all the things that are off-limits. You might not know why some foods or drinks aren’t allowed when you’re expecting a baby. Maybe your doctor scolds you about gaining weight and makes you paranoid about how it will affect your child.
During her pregnancy, Emily Oster found that women are usually given a list of rules to follow without any explanation or scientific evidence. So she decided to evaluate the data and figure out if these rules were correct. She is a leading economist and had experience doing this kind of work before her pregnancy, so it was easy for her to do research on the topic. In the end, she discovered that most of these rules were wrong; more often than not they weren’t based in science or fact at all.
Oster’s research debunks some myths and clarifies the truth behind pregnancy. For example, you’ll learn that it is not necessary to have a glass of wine while pregnant; invasive testing has risks as well; and TV shows about giving birth can be misleading.
Big Idea #1: Using the basic tools of economic decision theory, you can make informed choices about your pregnancy.
Economist Emily Oster took a critical approach to her pregnancy. She didn’t want to follow arbitrary rules or believe things that weren’t backed by reliable evidence. However, she found much of the information out there was contradictory and unreliable. Her doctor also gave her strict edicts instead of answering questions for her. When Oster asked about medical recommendations, she expected an outline of potential risks and benefits along with supporting evidence. Instead, there were rigid guidelines: “Amniocentesis is only for women over 35.”
So, she took her economic principles and applied them to the world of prenatal care. She found that there was no good data on what constituted a safe amount of drinking during pregnancy or how risky it was to have certain types of tests done during pregnancy. Therefore, she had to go directly to the source: academic medical literature.
Pregnancy research is a broad topic, and some of it is high-quality while other studies are low quality. Economists are trained to discern the difference between the two. Since economists don’t usually have access to randomized trials (the gold standard in research), they’re good at analyzing observational data from pregnant women who drink alcohol anyway. They can apply that skill to pregnancy research and find that many recommendations were based on overly cautious interpretations of flawed studies.
The second element of an economist’s framework is to assess the costs and benefits of a decision. This assessment depends on each person, as people have different preferences and values. However, it is still helpful for women to know what their options are so they can make good decisions instead of blindly following recommendations.
The following conclusions were made after the author researched many aspects of pregnancy. Some of her findings supported conventional wisdom, while others challenged it. The evidence won’t make your decisions for you, but will help you to think critically and decide what’s best for you.
Big Idea #2: Reviewing the research paves the way for a smooth pregnancy.
If you’re having trouble getting pregnant, there are many things to consider. For example, how old is too old? Is birth control affecting your fertility? There’s a lot of information out there that can help you get pregnant, and some of it isn’t important.
Age is not a factor in getting pregnant. It’s true that fertility goes down after age 35, but 36 percent of women over 40 got pregnant within a year. Physical condition doesn’t matter, either. While being overweight does increase the risk for complications for both mother and child, it won’t make any difference when it comes to conceiving. The best time to conceive is during ovulation or one day before ovulation because sperm can survive inside the female body for up to five days prior to ovulation and fertilization occurs most easily during this period. There are three ways you can figure out when you’re ovulating: temperature charting (which involves taking your temperature every morning), testing cervical mucus (which requires checking your vaginal secretions throughout the month) and pee sticks (which only work right before or on the day of ovulation).
