Both type 1 and type 2 diabetes sharply raise the risk of pregnancy complications, research has found.
UK experts say diabetic women should be offered specialist foetal heart scans because of the increased risk of serious abnormalities and infant death.
The British Medical Journal study also advises diabetic women to take higher than usual doses of folic acid.
Researchers say that, with diabetes rates rising, it is vital that women are made aware of the risks.
It is unacceptable that women are losing their babies or giving birth to babies with major defects unnecessarily
They found that the rate at which babies died shortly after birth was four times higher for women with both types of the disease compared with the general population.
Maggie Blott, a consultant obstetrician at London’s King’s College Hospital, said greater efforts had to be made to inform women about the risks of diabetes.