Survey on Pregnancy and High Elevation

My five-month pregnant friend at 13,000 feet elevation

I've been out hiking to mountain tops this week with a friend who is five months pregnant. During one of our hikes, we got in a conversation about high elevation exposure while pregnant. My friend conducts fieldwork on mountain tops. Her doctor had looked into the literature, but hadn't found much information, so had cleared her for staying two weeks above 10,000 feet. For her next jaunt into the mountains, her doctor recommended that she spend the evenings at a lower elevation to make sure that her oxygen levels would resaturate in case her baby was having any stress during the days. My friend was hiking as well as I was, so I was really impressed!

Between hikes, I had a chance to check my email and saw a request from two doctors to post a link to a survey about pregnancy, exercise, and high elevation on my blog. It's not like you can really run a controlled experiment on high elevation pregnancy exposure ("hey, you pregnant lady, go spend two months above 10,000 feet and tell us how you and your baby do, you may or may not have some consequences"). However, this survey can gather some information that may provide doctors with a little more data for making recommendations in the future.

I filled out the survey, and if you'd like to, just click on the link below.

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Looking For Female Participants For a Research Survey on Pregnancy, Exercise and High Altitude Exposure

Very little is known about the safety of travel and exercise at high altitude during pregnancy. Furthermore, although exercise is considered safe during pregnancy some activities, such as downhill skiing, are discouraged and many women modify their exercise regimes during pregnancy
We are conducting a research project to study what kind of exercise women participate in during pregnancy and whether they travel to high altitude during pregnancy. Our goal is to use the information obtained in the survey results to provide advice to physicians and their pregnant patients who want to travel to high elevations. If you are physically active and have been pregnant you may be able to provide useful information for our study, which is being run jointly through the University of Washington and the University of Colorado.

If you choose to participate, you will find a link to the anonymous on-line survey at the bottom of this email. The survey will take 15-20 minutes to complete and does not require you to provide any personal information.

Eligible participants are women who have completed a pregnancy and are physically active. You do not need to have been to high altitude during pregnancy to participate. If you are currently pregnant with your first pregnancy, please wait until after delivery to complete the survey.

Participation in this study is voluntary. You may decline to answer any question in the survey. All of the information you provide in the survey will remain anonymous. Although you will not benefit directly from this survey, we anticipate that information learned from the survey will help physicians and pregnant women who wish to travel and exercise at high altitude.

If you have any questions, feel free to email us at linda.keyes@aya.yale.edu oraluks@u.washington.edu, although please be reminded that the confidentiality of emails cannot be guaranteed. We appreciate your time and effort in completing this survey and look forward to reviewing the information you provide.

Click here to complete this survey: https://catalyst.uw.edu/webq/survey/aluks/204130
If the link does not work, you can copy and paste it in your web browser.

PLEASE REMEMBER TO CLICK ON "SUBMIT" AT THE END OF THE SURVEY TO ENSURE THAT YOUR ANSWERS ARE ALL SAVED PROPERLY.

Sincerely,
Linda E. Keyes, MD
Assistant Clinical Professor, Emergency Medicine
University of Colorado, Denver

Andrew M. Luks, MD
Associate Professor, Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine
University of Washington