Tissue testing after ERPC

[bananafish81]

We discovered at our 10w scan last week that I'd had a MMC - no fetal heartbeat and baby measured only 9+3 (after seeing and hearing a beautiful heartbeat at 7+1 and 8+5)

We had the ERPC done privately so we could get the tissue testing done to see if it would give us any answers (BUPA paid for the ERPC but won't pay for investigations so I'm expecting a bill for the histology and cytology testing)

The histology report said they were able to retrieve 'products of conception' for cytogenetic testing, which I think means they were able to find tissue that was definitely pregnancy related and not just maternal tissue

There was also no evidence of molar pregnancy

Has anyone had the tissue testing done? What kind of information should we be expecting it to give us?

I'm assuming that if there were chromosomal abnormalities then it will hopefully be able to identify this, and ideally which ones?

I'm told it will also tell us whether it was a baby boy or girl, although I'm not sure I'm ready to know that. Although if the mc was due to something like Turner syndrome that's obviously only carried on the XX chromosome so pretty damn self evident

We asked the Dr not to send the cytology report through in the post but to give us them in person at our follow up consultation. If the baby was chromosomally normal and it's my body that rejected it, I need to be given that information in context where we can discuss it

The histology report was pretty grim reading, as you'd expect from an autopsy of your dead baby. No nice way to dress up phrases like 'Partially necrotic decidua' and 'Multiple fragments of pale brown tissue'

So if anyone has any experiences of having the tissue testing done post mc, I'd be very grateful for any insight you can share so we can prepare ourselves as best we can. TIA

I've no experience of this (I had medical management) but hopefully someone who has will be along soon. I'm sorry for your loss x

I had a ercp the day before my 12 week scan and tissue was sent for histology, I'm sorry I can't really remember details of the letter I got 10 yrs ago, but I think the suggestion was there was no identifiable abnormality, it still hurts now, the loss of that baby and I've had two more since, three in total, be kind to yourself

Thanks ladies. I'm so very sorry for your losses too

All very raw right now but we hope the testing will help give us some answers

Is this first baby?

Yes. First pregnancy. Miracle baby after 2 cycles of IVF

Although this was my first loss (and first pregnancy) I'd had the clotting disorder tests that the NHS will run for recurrent miscarriage. They all came back as normal - so at least we know that it might have been preventable if only I'd taken a 15p baby aspirin to thin my blood

I'm really sorry, it hurts a lot, also you need time to physically recover, you were pregnant with all those hormones, your body will be confused. I was planning on getting my maternity clothes out after scan as I was getting a bit of tummy bloating so my body was reactive to the pregnancy (my second one). People will try to tell you positive stories and you might be pissed off with them, but the future is still there, I have a lovely new nephew (natural conception after mum and dad went through failed ivf and finally a successful ivf)
One of the things I did to help was plant something in the garden that would bloom at the time of baby's birthday, it helped me and I looked forward to seeing it in the garden each year

Thanks Bunty

Yes I too had a very bloated tummy so looked like a had quite a bump going on, although it was bloat rather than baby. That was def related to the progesterone pessaries I was on - my tummy’s basically back to how it was before

Sadly I know all too many women who’ve suffered miscarriages - 1,2,3 even 4. And most have gone on to have healthy subsequent pregnancies, which gives me great hope

Congratulations on your new nephew!

I’m interested to see what the Dr says at our follow up (4 weeks post ERPC) about how long we need to wait before we can do another cycle. Emotionally, I'd like to go again asap, however obviously as you say, we'll doubtless have to wait a certain length of time to let my body physically recover.

We have four frozen embryos on ice, but I'm keen to do another fresh IVF cycle, so that we could do genetic testing, and reduce the risk of m/c by ensuring we only transfer a viable embryo. All our frosties are untested, so we'd just have to play lucky dip and hope that one of them would stick.

That’s a beautiful way of remembering your baby, what a lovely tribute to their memory

I'm just terrified that the testing will show that the foetus was chromosomally normal, and essentially that my body killed our baby

Oh bananafish, you poor thing. Your body is not you! You are doing everything you can to keep all your babies alive.

I do remember reading an article a while ago where researchers had photographed the miscarried foetus in situ, before the ERPC (with the mother's consent). Even fetuses that were chromosomally normal hadn't always grown as they needed to to be viable. Just pure luck. Biology isn't so black and white. Which is scary, but also means we can get lucky sometimes.

Thank you sandy your kindness really means so very much

It's also very possible to get a false negative for chromosomal abnormalities, depending on the level of contamination of maternal tissue (whereby my DNA shows no genetic abnormalities)

Unfortunately whichever way it goes there are no easy answers but we hope whatever comes out may help us in the next IVF cycle to hopefully get a happier outcome

Hi, please could you tell me The company name who you used for testing tissue
/ baby ? I’m currently looking for a place that would test on something I have been given and I’m not sure where to go. Thank you

@bananafish81 how have things turned out for you? I had testing done after an erpc in April and just found out the other day that the baby had triploidy.