A new Danish study found each extra hour of bending forward at work during early pregnancy raised the risk of miscarriage by 36%.

It also found each extra hour of walking per day increased the risk of miscarriage by 18% and each hour of standing increased it by 3%.

If you’re pregnant and have a physical job, or are trying to follow the advice to stay active, these results might be alarming and seem at odds with the usual advice to stay active.

But most miscarriages have nothing to do with what a woman did or didn’t do.

Let’s have a closer look at what the study investigated and found, and what this actually means for women who are pregnant or planning a pregnancy.

What the researchers did

The Danish researchers used national health and employment records to track more than 800,000 pregnancies between 2004 and 2018.

They matched each woman’s job title to a database that estimates the amount of standing, walking and bending in that line of work. They didn’t ask women what they did at work.

The database itself was built from motion sensors 403 pregnant Danish workers wore, along with expert ratings for every job.

The researches then statistically analysed the difference in the risk of miscarriage, based on the activity that may be required for each occupation.

Just over one in ten........

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