Husband doesn't want to pay early pregnancy scan

[Newmamak]

My husband doesn't want to pay for an early scan ( I'm hopefully 7 weeks now) because he views it as we are paying the NHS with our taxes for one. He is very tight with money, not stingy but his immediate response is to never spend anything (I'm not complaining, he has good money sense and savings) but his reaction was really hurtful to me as it's only £55 and last week we went out to dinner in a nice restaurant with his friends and our share cost £80 alone so I can't understand why that 1 meal is more important than an early scan. It really hurt me that he is not excited about it like I am. He is all logic and I know I'm more emotional than normal if that's possible, but everything with him is so unemotional that I just feel so alone. Especially because I can't tell anyone. Once I started crying with disappointment, and explained why, he said just get the scan. But I'm so hurting right now. I know he doesn't process like I do and is trying his best, all housework, foot rubs dinner every day but I'm just so disappointed. I've felt so emotionally lonely the past few weeks I can't even being myself to hug him right now... am I completely unreasonable? Does anyone understand?

@Sometimeswinning what scan is it you're referring to?

Crikey what an unhealthy financial relationship, this doesn't bode well for maternity leave etc.

Why don't you just book the scan? If he chooses to go with you - great! Also, the relief once you see the bubba, is incredible. Just do it for yourself .

Completely agree with you.

Alfie here has unresolved anger management issues, which are very clear from the content of her posts.

I will stop engaging - there is little point. She thinks she knows best and yet still hasn’t addressed the stats put up re maternal and infant mortality in the US versus UK, given that apparently the US is so much better (it’s not!).

We can be doing better here for sure (no one said the NHS was perfect, certainly not me) but we have this thing called Health Economic analysis which is used when looking at expenditure and service provision. There is no benefit to early scans for outcomes. Better nutrient status, and mental health and activity are three such things that will help healthy pregnancies but Early scans tell you almost nothing -THAT IS A FACT.

Also, I am a Doctor.

You don’t have to like that, but that’s how it is.

I have not been remotely rude on here. Not once. Sorry, you don’t like facts that disagree with your very embedded personal beliefs.

And No amount of aggressive swearing and name-calling (I won’t report you, I think you have shown yourself up just fine on your own) and argument changes the fact that you know very little and are a clear example of Dunning-Kruger (you’ll look that up I bet in true DK style, you won’t know what it is 😂).

Early scans in low risk pregnancies, which is most pregnancies, make no different to clinical outcomes, and that it is an industry in itself to make money. You’ll also notice most of them actually say it’s not medical advice and to go and see a Doctor. That tells you what they are selling - very clearly.

6 week old embedded embryos don’t have heart beats! Fact. Early scans are unnecessary and in a nervous, anxious person can be worse than not getting one at all.

Stay as mad as you like about these facts. And don’t take my word for it - we have many Royal Colleges here with lots freely available data for you to peruse.

But actual doctors also refer to it as a heartbeat too in the early stages? It isn't just money making private scanners.

It's irrelevant if it's a fully formed heart beat or not. Generally they expect to see one by 6 weeks. If they don't and everything else looks as it should, they ask you to return for a follow up scan, in case your dates are wrong or whatever. Actual heart or not, the movement, or lack of, is an indication of whether the pregnancy is progressing. And I've never heard it referred to as anything other than a heartbeat by medical professionals in the numerous early scans I've had in multiple pregnancies.

It’s referred to as a heartbeat as a colloquial equivalent because it’s a simplification.

I don’t know why people conflate ‘seeing a heartbeat’ with ‘this is what reduces the miscarriage risk’. The scan does not reduce the risk. It just tells you where on that trajectory you may or may not be. It doesn’t help stop miscarriages. Bloody hell of having a scan every day would have improved my chances in ivf I would have done it but it doesn’t. I won’t even POAS till after day 30 now because it’s prurient torture to keep testing testing testing when the result is a foregone conclusion and none of it will help change the management.

I get why it might be psychologically reassuring, rightly or wrongly, but it doesn’t improve your chances! It just potentially tells you the outcome sooner (or not). I’m a clinician and I agree with @Quincythequince re health economic analysis on this one.

Nobody is saying a scan reduces your chances of a miscarriage 🙄They are saying the risk is lowered if everything is as it should be. What's so hard to understand about that?

Personally I'd rather know sooner than later if I were carrying an embryo that had stopped growing weeks prior, rather than becoming further bonded with a baby that isn't there. Missed miscarriages are extremely common.

A scan isn't going to tell me I'm going to have a healthy baby at term, no, but it would certainly give me peace of mind hopefully, even if for just a short while.

Nobody is saying a scan reduces your chances of a miscarriage 🙄They are saying the risk is lowered if everything is as it should be. What's so hard to understand about that?

Well I don’t understand it.

And that's fine 😊Often it takes some people a little longer than others.

It often helps if the person who said it explains when it’s unclear. 🤷‍♀️

Ok.

PP, apparently a clinician, seemed to be under the impression that people thought an early scan would prevent a miscarriage. None of the posts I've read indicate this.

Of course a scan can't prevent a miscarriage. It can, however, rule out many things which will ultimately lead to a miscarriage. Ectopic, blighted ovum, irregular shaped sac, size of embryo. Even without seeing a 'heartbeat' there are many things that can show if a pregnancy isn't, or may not be, viable. Therefore if all these indicators aren't there, then there's every likelihood of a good outcome. Therefore chance of miscarriage decreases.

Miscarriage can still happen of course, but less likely. This gives women a bit of peace of mind, during an anxious time when you are otherwise ignorant to what's going on in there. Really not sure what the problem is in understanding this at all. Of course,some women may prefer to remain blissfully ignorant. That is their choice. No need to belittle those who don't though.

Hope that helps.

The point is: as PP above said, early scans make no difference to clinical outcomes.

Theres another thread where there’s a woman considering getting into debt for an early scan.

I don’t have anything against them if that’s what people want to do- but if it makes someone more anxious I wouldn’t recommend it, if it just leads to wanting more scans I wouldn’t recommend it, if it leads to a woman thinking she now won’t miscarry I wouldn’t recommend it. If it’s taken as face value on the day then if a woman wants to pay for it, up to her. But no the NHS shouldn’t be paying for these non clinically indicated scans.

FWIW I would probably consider paying for an early scan if I got to 8 weeks because you can see a bit more and it will be the furthest I ever got. It will be meaningless in terms of clinical detail but it might be the only baby photo I ever get. And no I wouldn’t expect it on the NHS because despite my shit history it wouldn’t be clinically indicated.