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Pregnancy

Talk about every stage of pregnancy, from early symptoms to preparing for birth.

Original poster

flow murmur?

8 replies

dundeemarmalade · 08/12/2010 15:00

just been to break happy news of bfp to gp. all was going well til she got out her stethoscope, and heard a heart murmur. WTF? And then said not to worry, only a flow murmur, and to get an ecg at the surgery. but it's now written on my notes that i have a murmur, and i'm concerned that even if ecg reveals nothing sinister (which is what's most likely to happen) i'm going to be pushed down the "high risk" route into the jolly old obstetric unit. Help!

OP posts:
BreastmilkDoesAFabLatte · 08/12/2010 15:12

Don't panic, please. Heart murmurs and particularly flow murmurs are common during pregnancy (I think more than 50% women get them), and usually (I think around 97% of the time) completely harmless. So really, I think that if the ECG comes back clear (and it probably will) and you have no other cardiac risk factors (ie history of congenital heart disease or rhematic fever, chest pains, difficulties exercising etc) it shouldn't get you classified as high risk. But I do understand your worry. I hope you can get an ECG done soon and be reassured.

Original poster
dundeemarmalade · 08/12/2010 16:22

Thanks for that - ah, the magic and wisdom of mumsnet!
Given that I've been sledging every other day without any problems for the past 10 days, and have just hauled my dd back from nursery by sledge without feeling at all tired I'm guessing I don't have an underlying cardiac thing going on.

ECG is next week. Here's hoping I am, as usual, completely normal...

OP posts:
saltnvinigarcrips · 08/12/2010 19:19

Hello, I had this and it was all fine. Not classified as high risk, i think they just like to make sure everything is fine. Better to be safe than sorry in my opinion.

Original poster
dundeemarmalade · 08/12/2010 19:37

Absolutely agree - with my rational head on it is clearly much better to know if there's a real problem. Irrational head however gets worked up about being labelled with a risk inappropriately (happened before re. smtg totally unrelated, made everything so much harder and took months and months to get over).

Thanks to both of you for your kind words and good sense.

OP posts:
BreastmilkDoesAFabLatte · 09/12/2010 12:22

Yes, the risk classification system can be a scary one with draconian implications... and one often controlled more by the insurance companies by the doctors. But equally, a mechanism which classifies too many people as high risk beomes meaningless. And I think that if everyone with harmless clinical signs was high risk, then the whole mechansism would implode.

Original poster
dundeemarmalade · 09/12/2010 13:06

I think what bothers me is that in our area we have very uneven provision in terms of community midwives - last time I was bounced into an obstetric birth (as a pretty naive first time mum) by a midwife who met me for the first time at 40 weeks, looked at my notes, thought she saw a problem and wouldn't listen when we tried to explain that it wasn't - consultants had given us all clear etc. etc.
It's not so much the system of risk classification that bothers me as the unthinking application of it by a very few unhelpful people!
am thinking of investigating independent midwives to obviate the need for playing helpfulness roulette again Wink

OP posts:
Original poster
dundeemarmalade · 15/12/2010 12:38

Just to let you both know, and to say thanks again, had ecg today and all NORMAL, as expected and hoped. Phew.
Have a happy Christmas!

OP posts:
BreastmilkDoesAFabLatte · 15/12/2010 16:56

Fab. Hope you're able to relax and enjoy the festivities Xmas Grin

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