blighted ovum

can you shed some light on what exactly a blighted ovum is?

Dear Lindi,
A blighted ovum is when in the early days of the pregnancy, the cells that normally would progress and develop into the fetus stop developing but the cells that form the fetal sac keep developing. One way this can happen is at the blastocyst stage. In a normal blastocyst, you'll find two separate cell types, a trophectoderm and the inner cell mass. The inner cell mass is destined to form the fetus. The trophectoderm cells are destined to form the fetal part of the placenta, or yolk sac. Surprisingly, the trophectoderm cells can keep on going for a while even if the fetal inner cell mass cells have stopped. So it is possible to see an empty sac on ultrasound and no fetal pole. A later ultrasound will fail to show a heart beat as expected because the fetal cells are not there. A blighted ovum is also call anembryonic gestation. This condition is the earliest cause of miscarriage but sometimes the body is slow to recognize that the pregnancy is non-viable and doctors may advise a D&C. This link explains some more about it http://www.americanpregnancy.org/pre...ghtedovum.html Hope this helps. Carole

Thanks. Do you have any knowledge about why the cells that would progress to form the fetus fail to do so?

I think it is usually attributed to a chromosomal problem but I don't know if that is the only cause.