Thanks to a remarkable medical advancement, in the form of a ‘once a month’ pill, developed by the researchers at the Liverpool University, the suffering of repeated miscarriages undergone by countless women the world over, will soon be a thing of the past.

One of the leading experts Professor Siobhan Quenby, of School of Reproductive and Developmental Medicine, Liverpool University, highlighted the fact in her earlier study too, that one-third of the women who go through recurrent miscarriages have high levels of immune cells – the uterine Natural Killer (NK) cells.

A total of 120 pregnant women, with high risk of repeated miscarriages, were observed and almost half of them had an unusually high number of NK cells in their uterus.

In fact, the high number of NK cells implied that there were also a high number of blood vessels formed in the early pregnancy stage. Quenby explained this as follows - more blood vessels means an increase in oxygen supply in the womb during the early weeks of pregnancy, when the actual requirement is low oxygen levels for proper implantation of the embryo.

The pill that has been developed comprises a steroid commonly used in treating asthma and allergies, The medication can control the immune response, thereby protecting the developing fetus and reducing the risk of miscarriage. The introductory trials of this steroid – ‘Prednisolone’ – have shown promising results.

In the words of Quenby herself: “I have already treated 40 women who have had recurrent miscarriages due to elevated levels of NK cells and 30 of those have had babies now. One had suffered 22 miscarriages.”

Quenby has further stated that the drug will undergo more trials in future to ‘make sure the results are not simply down to the placebo effect’. Once proven beneficial in more cases, ‘Prednisolone’ will practically bring a ray of hope to a number of women experiencing unexplained repeated miscarriages.

The researchers accept the fact that ‘Prednisolone’ is not completely free from side effects, commonly mood swings and increased appetite. Still, the positive side of it is that ‘most women would need to take it for just three months’.