Good news for pregnant women who experience severe sickness

Good news was announced last week, of the reimbursement of Cariban when prescribed by GPs for hyperemesis gravidarum.

This has been a long time coming, and will be a great support and comfort to those women who need it most.

Those of us who have not experienced hyperemesis gravidarum, or very severe pregnancy sickness, cannot truly appreciate just how debilitating it can be.

Imagine severe nauseousness all day long with little to no let-up, and being able to keep nothing down.

The closest most of us have experienced to this is a really bad tummy bug.

But then imagine no end in sight, no reassurance that this is probably just a 24 hour thing. Instead, the panic of facing into potentially 35 - 40 weeks of this, as many women with hyperemesis gravidarum don’t experience the usual reprieve of ‘morning sickness’ easing once they hit the second trimester.

Some describe needing to get sick right up to the day they give birth!

The impact of hyperemesis gravidarum is significant. For many women, it leads to being unable to get out of bed in the mornings, unable to work, unable to look after existing family, unable to function.

Obviously, it affects energy, hydration, weight, and mental health. It leaves women with the very difficult decision of whether or not to plan future pregnancies, for fear they face the same experience all over again.

Imagine all this, and then imagine that, due to financial constraints, you cannot access the medication that could potentially make life liveable for you during your pregnancy - medication that could stop or ease the nausea and vomiting.

You cannot afford to pay the high cost for the medication, and you cannot access a consultant to prescribe the medication in such a way that it would get at least partially covered on government medication schemes.

Here in Ireland, this has been the case for a long time, unfortunately.

Cariban is a medication that is suitable in pregnancy to treat severe sickness in pregnancy. Until last year, it was not covered in any way financially, and was costing up to €3,000 for women to avail of it.

Then, in March, 2023, as part of the Women’s Health Initiative, a reimbursement option was set up by Health Minister Stephen Donnelly where women could get the cost of the medication covered either on the Drug Payment Scheme or Medical Card scheme, but only if the drug was started by a consultant.

This option wasn’t accessible for most women, however, who didn’t see a consultant until 12 weeks, at which time they’d often already experienced months of suffering.

Without this approval process, it was costing too much for some women to avail of Cariban during their pregnancy, and they were desperately rationing doses of it to try and get at least some reprieve.

Now, though, this access barrier will be removed from August 1 as GPs will be able to prescribe the medication and have it covered on one of the above schemes, depending on the patient’s situation.

This comes off the back of a vocal and active campaign, led largely by women, who have themselves suffered due to previous access barriers.

Negotiations between the pharmaceutical company and the government to agree a reimbursement price have been successful, and it has now been added to the HSE reimbursement list, making it accessible for women the way all other drugs are.

If you or somebody you know is suffering from severe morning sickness, speak with your GP - while some sickness is a normal part of pregnancy, it’s not something that you have to suffer in silence.

You may benefit from the help of medication such as this, or from discussing other actions you could try taking to bring you some much-needed relief.