late miscarriage and recurrent miscarriage - normal tests afterwards

[Lizzie07]

Hello all :waves:

I lost my little boy nearly 4 weeks ago at 23 weeks, due to a blood clot behind my placenta that didn't reabsorb. It got bigger and bigger and eventually caused my placenta to abrupt, my waters to break and the death of my little boy. I had lots and lots of blood taken after the birth and believe they are doing a whole planel of blood testing which is standard as I have also had 3 previous miscarriages.

I got a letter through this morning requesting that I go for a Pelvic (transvaginal) Ultra Sound and I have gone into panic mode, fearing that they know something I don't...stupidly looked on the net and saw that they use these ultrasounds for detecting cancer....however i had a smear in July and have heard nothing so that must be okay musn't it? I am therefore wondering if this is just a normal test after a late or recurring miscarriage to rule out uterine anomalies - does anyone know?

thanks
X

I'm so sorry about you losing your little boy due to placental abruption Lizzie
The ultrasound will be part of the tests they are doing to see if there was any underlying cause for the abruption. (I lost a son at 22 weeks, not due to abruption or any other identifiable cause).
I would hazard a guess and say that they are checking the structure of your uterus and specifically looking for fibroids or signs of endometriosis.
Do you have a contact at the hospital (the consultant's secretary perhaps) who can reassure you? The last thing you need after such a bereavement is to feel worried about what is probably a routine exam.

Hi Lizzie Sorry to hear about you losing your little boy and also the worries you are now feeling. After I had my first miscarriage I had vaginal ultrasounds and I think it was just to see that everything looked normal and that there was no obvious reasons for a problem (in my case it did show up a bicorneate uterus). I think these scans have lots of uses, one of which is to detect some cancers, but yours is likely to be checking for a cause of what happened. Like Marina said, why dont you phone for some reassurance or speak to your GP. Good Luck.

I"m very sorry to hear about the loss of your babies. I have had investigation for recurrent miscarriage and had a transvaginal ultra sound. One of the things they looked at were the ovaries (to see if I had PCOS) and I think they were also looking to see if there were any abnormalities in the uterus. My understanding is that this kind of ultrasound is just part of the routine battery of tests they give to people who have had a number of losses. I think it would be very unlikely to be anything to do with cervical cancer investigations. If anything abnormal is spotted during a smear test, you would be referred for colposcopy, not an ultrasound. But I would second what Marina said, and contact your consultant to discuss anything you are concerned about.