Factor V Leiden and Blood Clots

A Potential Cause of Multiple Miscarriages in Early Pregnancy

Miscarriages are a devastating experience for anyone. For those people who suffer multiple miscarriages, the emotional damage can be devastating. Often, your doctor cannot offer a cause for the miscarriages and friends and family members may try to comfort you by saying that it happened for a reason.

What if the reason is something like an inherited blood mutation such as Factor V Leiden? In my own personal experience, I suffered repeated miscarriages before my doctor realized that this blood mutation may be causing clots to form in the placenta or umbilical cord.

Once my doctor and I reasoned out that Factor V Leiden was a potential cause, I took the proper precautions including injection heparin 2 times each day throughout the pregnancy. As a result, I finally was able to carry to term a fully healthy and perfect baby boy.

What is Factor V Leiden?

It is NOT a disease. You receive one gene from your mother and one gene from your father of a certain protein that the body needs for proper blood clotting. However, in some cases, you may inherit one or both genes that are mutated which substantially increases your risk of developing a blood clot.

If you inherit one mutant gene, then you are considered to be heterozygous and have about a 3 fold chance over the general population to develop a clot. In my case, I inherited the gene from my mother (determined via blood tests). If you inherited both mutated genes than both your mother and father carry the mutated gene and you are considered to be homozygous and have more than a 30 fold chance over the general population to develop a clot.

For those individuals that are homozygous for Factor V Leiden, your risk of blood clots dramatically increases.

Who gets Factor V Leiden?

This gene mutation affects approximately 5% of the Caucasian population in the United States, particularly those of Northern-European ancestry. It is much less common in people of African-American or Hispanic descent.

Although you may not even know you have Factor V Leiden, you are at a greater risk for developing blood clots. However, having this mutation does NOT mean that you will ever experience a blood clot.