How much pineapple to ripen cervix

Join me each week as we work together to get evidence based information into the hands of families and professionals around the world. As a reminder, this information is not medical advice. See EBBirth. Today, we are continuing our series on the evidence on different natural labor induction methods.

If you go to our archives at EvidenceBasedBirth. Eating pineapple is a popular suggestion I see on social media when people are looking for ways to get labor going naturally.

Pineapple, or ananas comosus fruit, ripe or unripe, has been used as a traditional medicine to induce labor and terminate pregnancies in many part of the world. For example, traditional healers in Fiji prescribe unripe pineapple for the purpose of terminating early pregnancy.

The use of unripe fruit juice, or aqueous, or watery extract of pineapple to induce abortion is also practiced in the Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Trinidad. In India, a hot aqueous extract from ripe pineapple is also used to terminate pregnancy.

The enzyme bromelain is thought to be the active ingredient that contributes to cervical ripening, or the softening and thinning of the cervix that can help start labor. Unfortunately, we do not have any clinical research studies on pineapple for natural labor induction. However, there are a few studies on rats and some Petri dish studies on isolated human uterine tissue.

A study by Nwankudu demonstrated that pineapple juice from ripe fruit is capable of inducing strong uterine contractions in non-pregnant rat tissue in vitro. So when they looked at rat tissue from the uterus in non-pregnant rats in a Petri dish, pineapple juice could induce contractions. A followup study in by the same researchers randomized pregnant rats to normal saline or salt water or pineapple juice by mouth for 24 hours, 36 hours, or 48 hours, and then studied different doses of pineapple juice on pregnant rat uterine tissue in vitro.

In the in vivo experiment with live rats, there were no abortions and all of the rats littered at full term. The authors think that this suggests that digestive enzymes could be causing the juice to lose its uterotonic properties when taken by mouth. In the in vitro or Petri dish experiment, all doses of pineapple juice significantly induced contractions in the isolated rat uterine tissue. They think this could be due to the combined effects of bromelain and other components of the juice.

They exposed the tissue to pineapple juice at different doses and to oxytocin, a hormone that can induce labor, and the contractions induced by pineapple juice were similar to those of oxytocin.

Another study published by Monji et al. The human tissue was obtained with informed consent from women who were having elective cesareans in Singapore. The researchers found that the pineapple extract induced strong uterine contractions in both the rat and the human tissue.

A followup study by the same researchers examined the uterotonic effect of pineapple extract in rats, both in vitro and in vivo. The researchers collected ripe and unripe pineapples from Malaysia and prepared extracts. They compared the stimulatory response to pineapple extracts in live rats and isolated rat uterine tissue.

Ripe pineapple extract stimulated uterine activity, but not the unripe pineapple extract, which is contrary to customary beliefs. The contraction response increased in late pregnant rat uterine tissue, suggesting that it may help in inducing labor. This study identified the neurotransmitter serotonin as a major bioactive compound that contributed to the uterotonic activity of ripe pineapple extract in vitro and in vivo.

Now, this study was limited to rats, so further studies are needed to clarify how pineapple extract could affect contractions throughout human pregnancy. So far, there is no evidence that eating pineapple or drinking pineapple juice will cause miscarriage or induce labor at term. As a natural induction method, eating pineapple would not be considered to be evidence-based, but it is also not likely to be harmful, unless it gives you a sore mouth.

Also, it might not be the best option for people who are limiting their carb intake, for example, if you have gestational diabetes. Another study, by Bovbjerg et al in , using data from the third Pregnancy Infection and Nutrition Cohort focused on pregnant people who experienced spontaneous labor. In , Carbone et al. Semen is rich in prostaglandins E and F2-alpha, and these prostaglandins are used in higher doses to induce labor.

Researchers have taken samples of cervical mucus from pregnant people and found that the concentration of prostaglandins was 10 to 50 times higher than normal two to four hours after having sex. Second, sex sometimes includes nipple stimulation, and nipple or breast stimulation has been found to increase the chance of going into labor in the next 72 hours among people at term with a favorable or ripened cervix. This is because nipple stimulation leads to higher levels of the hormone oxytocin in the body.

The synthetic version of the same hormone, pitocin, is commonly used to induce labor. Researchers think that nipple stimulation only helps to induce labor in late pregnancy, once oxytocin receptors are fully present in the uterus.

We talk more about the research evidence on nipple simulation for natural labor induction in EBB episode Third, sexual intercourse and female orgasm have been linked to an increase in uterine contractions.

There may be mechanical effects, both possibly from penetration and from muscle contractions in the sexual organs. Researchers have monitored the fetal heart rate and uterine activity in three healthy pregnant women during sexual intercourse. This was a classic study published by Chayen et al. They noticed increased uterine activity and fetal heart rate changes immediately following orgasm.

Excitingly, we have the very first meta-analysis on this topic that just came out in In a meta-analysis, researchers combine the results from multiple studies on the same topic into one large or meta-study.

Carbone et al. They included three randomized control trials with a total of nearly pregnant participants. The randomized trials included one by Tan published in , one by Omar published in , and one by Castro published in Two of the trials were from Malaysia, and one was from Portugal. The number of participants in the trials range from to 1, In all three of the trials, the intervention group was encouraged to have frequent vaginal sex.

Home Pregnancy Labour and birth Natural ways to get labour started. Bringing on labour: an overview. Your midwife can perform a cervical sweep to get labour going if you're overdue. Find out what it involves. More labour and birth videos. References Buckley SJ. Schaffir J. Birth — Herbal therapies in pregnancy: what works?

Unexpected consequences: women's experiences of a self-hypnosis intervention to help with pain relief during labour. BMC pregnancy and childbirth, 15, Complementary and alternative medicine for induction of labour. Women Birth 25 3 : Use of herbal medicines by pregnant women: What physicians need to know. Front Pharmacol. The association of sexual intercourse during pregnancy with labor onset.

Iranian Red Crescent medical journal, 17 1 , e Complementary therapies for labour and birth study: a randomised controlled trial of antenatal integrative medicine for pain management in labour.

BMJ Open 6:e The orgasmic history of oxytocin: love, lust, and labor. Methods of induction of labour: a systematic review. BMC Pregnancy Childbirth. Tips on encouraging a straightforward birth during labour National Childbirth Trust.

Inducing labour. National Institute for Health and Care Excellence. Bromelain, the enzyme in pineapple thought to cause contractions, is likely most potent at this point. Freshly picked, raw, juiced pineapple, including the core, should be used when consuming pineapple to induce labor. Pineapple is already high in sugar, at 16 grams per cup diabetics, stay away! The added sugar that sometimes accompanies canned pineapple is totally unnecessary.

In the same study on using pineapple to induce labor, it was shown that eating or drinking pineapple did not cause any miscarriages or abortions. Despite ingesting pineapple juice before pregnancy became full-term, each pregnancy resulted in a full-term birth. Eating pineapple remains relatively safe in pregnancy.

The thing is, when pineapple juice is placed directly on a uterus, it actually does cause strong contractions. Bromelain contracts the uterus in a similar way that oxytocin, or its synthetic Pitocin , does. No matter when you try 35 weeks, 36 weeks, 37 weeks, etc. Boy did my mouth HURT. And nope, no labor. I had been having prodromal labor for weeks though. The day my water broke, I had eaten a whole pineapple and drank about 3 cups of pineapple juice — it was all that I wanted. Not sure if there was a correlation, since I had already been craving it.

I never ate the core and went back and forth between fresh and canned. SIDE NOTE : I think it would be cool if this phenomenon pineapple juice coming into contact with a uterus and causing contractions was extensively researched and an alternative to Pitocin was created. The following is some practical advice for preparing a pineapple to attempt to induce labor. Have fun! Watch the following video for the easiest way to cut a pineapple. After reading this article, what are your thoughts?

Do you think pineapple to induce labor really works?