Pregnancy - Terminology

Terminology

One scientific term for the state of pregnancy is gravidity (adjective "gravid"), Latin for "heavy" and a pregnant female is sometimes referred to as a gravida. Similarly, the term parity (abbreviated as "para") is used for the number of times a female has given birth, counting twins and other multiple births as one pregnancy, and usually including stillbirths. Medically, a woman who has never been pregnant is referred to as a nulligravida, a woman who is (or has been only) pregnant for the first time as a primigravida, and a woman in subsequent pregnancies as a multigravida or multiparous. Hence, during a second pregnancy a woman would be described as gravida 2, para 1 and upon live delivery as gravida 2, para 2. An in-progress pregnancy, as well as abortions, miscarriages, or stillbirths account for parity values being less than the gravida number. In the case of twins, triplets etc., gravida number and parity value are increased by one only. Women who have never carried a pregnancy achieving more than 20 weeks of gestation age are referred to as nulliparous.