Reassurance needed!

[lullabellesmummy]

I am working myself up into such a state! I had my 28 wk ante-natal appt with my midwife on Tuesday, she measured my fundal height to be 25 cms.

I know fundal height measurements can be notoriously inaccurate but they can also be an indication of something wrong. She said baby was currently breech (not something I am worried about currently). Can this affect fundal height? Also, I am 5ft 10.

What is also bothering me is, we had a high risk of downs syndrome 1:50 (had amnio which came back all clear). I asked my consultant at the time if there was anything else which could have given us this high risk result. He said some people think the quality of the placenta can.

So now I'm putting the two and two together and worrying myself stupid about IUGR.

TIA x

Blimey you are working yourself up. Fundal height is a really crap indicator. It depends on so many factors and frankly babies do not grow in a linear fashion, one week they grow a lot, the next not at all, then a little bit the next week etc.

The quality of the placenta can be measured btw - with a special scan - I had them weekly with mine, they measure the blood flow between baby and placenta and it indicates how things are going. Having said, all mine showed fine and then I had pre-eclampsia and really crap placentas on delivery.

So you see, there is little point in worrying - nothing you can do either way and there is probably nothing to worry about.

In other words, don't meet trouble half way and DO NOT GOOGLE :)

Poor you to be in such a state. The only advice I can offer from my experiences is that breech DOES affect fundal measurements.
My DC3 was moving about so much (breech, transverse, extended breech etc) that the last few measurements were all over the place to the extend that would make the MW laugh...
Can you ask to be sent for a scan?

Thank you for your replies ladies!

I was wondering about a scan. I was under the impression if your were measuring +/- 2 cms or more, you would be sent for a scan?

They will scan you if it goes on more than four weeks.

lullabellesmummy - hopefully to reassure you - my fundal measurements have been between 1 and 3 cms below my weeks for pretty much the whole time. Midwife only seems really concerned when its 3 under and then has just seen me 2 weeks later, and then its been 2 cms under so its ok again!! I definitely think the baby's position when they measure has something to do with it - easier said than done, but try not to worry.

I am 5 ft 7 with a LONG torso and have consistently had fundal height measurements that are "too small". Kiddo was bang on average at 21 week scan, and again at the 28 week growth scan they decided I "had to have". If you are tall, then it is likely that your bump won;t project outwards as much - there's loads of room in your abdomen for things to expand into. And, as others have said here, fundal height measurements are unreliable. Good luck!

Hi there,

I am small anyway and lost a lot of weight at the beginning of the pregancy. I measured 21 cm at 25 weeks so the midwife sent me for scans although not urgently. When I had the scan they found she was bigger than average - that is despite me feeling utter crap, eating shite and being a bit anemic! So try not to worry, the chances are your baby is doing fine! Oh and mine is breech currently too...

Thank you all for your replies.

I'm not seeing the midwife for another 6 weeks so I have made an appt with my (lovely) GP for when I'll be 31 weeks to see how things are progressing. I'm a little annoyed that my midwife is happy to leave it 6 weeks.

My dd managed to go from 2 weeks under to 3 weeks over in 4 weeks time. And then back to average 2 weeks after that. She just moved around a lot and hadn't read the books about what she should be doing.

I have a tall friend who always measured under and had the tiniest bump all the way through. Her now 4yr old dd weighed 8lbs at birth and was absolutely fine. She was always told it was her height and she had no extra scans.

FH is pretty inaccurate. I have always measured at least 2 weeks behind (currently 37 + 4) and one week a different midwife measured me and according to her the bump had actually decreased in size - just goes to show that different people have different ways of measuring and it really isn't very scientific. I think that as long as there is reasonable growth on growth then you shouldn't worry (I know easier said than done!)

i dont get it. If the reason for measuring fundal height is to check for iugr, then why if you get a small result do they not check it out? 4 weeks seems a long time to me for a baby to be potentially struggling ( not wishing to scaremonger - just seems a bit slapdash), especially when it could be checked easily with a scan.