By Madeleine Coyne
August 18, 2020 - IUD Alert

“IUD (intrauterine device) birth control implants don’t always stay put. This may not come as a surprise, given the many lawsuits brought against the Mirena IUD for this reason. But when IUDs become misplaced, very serious risks and complications can arise.
An IUD can move from its position at the top of the uterus, sometimes even perforating a woman’s uterus, and as one contraception clinic informs its patients, “as a result of perforation the IUD can pass through the uterine wall; this is the rarest and most dangerous of all IUD complications. There have been cases where an IUD has migrated to areas of the pelvis, abdominal cavity, gastrointestinal tract and bladder.” In such cases, an IUD must be removed surgically.
However, perhaps nothing is more surprising than when an IUD ends up coming out of a mother’s birth canal during delivery, clasped in her baby’s chubby hands.
This is exactly what happened in Vietnam on June 30, 2020. Obstetrician, Dr. Tran Viet Phuong, said he couldn’t help but snap a picture and post it on Facebook. This picture has since gone viral, as it’s a remarkable occurence. “After delivery, I thought him holding the device was interesting, so I took a picture. I never thought it would receive so much attention,” said Phuong.
This beautiful, full-term baby boy now joins two other siblings, and he and his mother are both completely healthy. The 34-year-old mother had had the birth control device inserted into her uterus two years prior and was surprised to learn that the device failed to prevent her getting pregnant. Most sources tout that IUDs are more than 99% effective at preventing pregnancies, although others assert that the failure rate is between 1% and 3%. Given how many women have IUDs, those who become pregnant are more than a few people.
There are a number of stories of unexpected pregnancies with an IUD (another similar story went viral in 2017), and Dr. Phuong’s photo tells just one of them.”