anyone had an amnio and can give advice?

[wendyredhead]

I've decided, because of my age, to skip the tests and just go for an amnio and hope for the best. Just wondered about any personal experiences you might have had.

I hope you don't really leg it, WendyRH. MN needs a diversity of voices.

CAT=Contact Another Talker, you pay £5/yr to support MN and then you have privilege of forwarding messages to each other.

At the risk of Fio feeling patronised again... I was basically going to email that I think she might have a lot on her plate at the moment so please try to not get upset by her posts.

ANYWAY, These are hard things to discuss in public. I agonised for weeks about amnio decision but couldn't discuss it with anybody. I knew MN was out as a place to air my quandries, because there's a very active Special Needs community here, and in the SN community Downs is often cited as such a mild disability that it never justifies termination of pregnancy. I have family experience that leads me to conclude differently, but I don't want to upset anybody or argue about it... the whole thing is just such a personal decision.

I'm surprised that someone earlier up the thread (sorry can't remember who) was told that a post-nuchal scan 1:900 or so result warranted further screening! When I had my nuchal scan (4 yrs ago, aged 41) I was told a 1:240 or less result would be advised to go for further screening, anything better than that would be likely to be fine. My result,from the blood tests combined with the nuchal, were 1:278 (from an age-related risk of 1:41) and DS2 is fine and Dandy 3.5 yrs on! It certainly put my mind at rest.

With DS1, 4 yrs earlier, the nuchal scan wasn't common and I wasn't told about it. I had an amnio and had to go twice as the first time the baby was stubborn and wouldn't budge out of a potentially dangerous position (they couldn't get the needle in safely) so I had to go back a week later. Again, everything was fine and my mind was put at rest. I'm not sure I was any less reassured by the nuchal scan than I was by the amnio 4 yrs earlier.

My view is, everything in life carries some risk. But with odds of 1:278, the risk is massively stacked in your favour. An amnio means you can be certain about some things, but not everything, as many posters have pointed out. With the option of a nuchal scan (even though I had to pay for it privately) I was just glad to be able to avoid the intrusiveness and discomfort of an amnio, along with the risk to my baby.

Good luck with your baby Wendy, from another older mum!

You are very welcome wendy. Might I suggest that you at least consider staying on MN in an ante-natal club? I found my group to be absolutley terrific while I was pregnant and we still have a very active post-natal thread. You can ignore the rest of active conversations completely and just check your "Threads I'm On".

gess, I had ds2 last year! But we are in the US so maybe that's the difference. Anyway, I'm glad I chose amnio over CVS as everything turned out well and I just felt it was a more conclusive test IYKWIM.

Can I just clarify one point made earlier- by flack i think- about terminations. She says that a birth certificate is issued after 16 weeks and you have to have a funeral. A birth certificate isn't issued until after 24 weeks as the baby is considered to be a miscarriage before 24 weeks but a still birth after 24 weeks info here

You also don't have to have a funeral.

Also can I say that I did post on here when I came back high risk and had my amnio and I had a fantastic level of support

I think eidsvold, Thomcat & geekgirl in particular in the past have gone out of their way to give support to people going through difficult decisions at what must be some personal cost to themselves.

That;s weird jabberwocky- it may be because the amniotic banding problems were related to very early CVS which is no longer done iyswim. I think I read about it in this book which I think is now out of print but was probably the best book I read on pregnancy and included an excellent section on antenatal testing. I do understand that 'need to know' thing. I vaguely remember in my 1st pregnancy saying I would follow up a dodgy result as I needed to know (in fact had a v low result back after nuchal) even if we were planning to act on anything. Anyway after ds1 when everything was supposedly great then a whole lot worse, I think I decided there was no point ever tyring to plan anything and I should just wing it But I do understand where you're coming from with that.

aviatrix- In a way i regret the amnio in that I only decided at the very last minute to have it done and I would not have terminated.

My real worry at the time was Edward's Syndrome as there have been 2 babies born locally who have had this syndrome, one being born the day befre my dd. In my mind I had convinced myself that my baby would have ES- that was terrifying me.

Even though I didn't post on the SN boards here I did read a lot of posts and have obviously read lots of Thomcat's over the years I have been here and how much joy Lottie brings. Downs Syndrome was te least of my worries tbh. I gained a lot of comfort and help from the SN board.

Wendyredhead - I'm 42 and got my nuchal+blood test result back at 1/900. So, yes, it's possible! With the 1/900 result I decided to skip the amnio because the risk of miscarriage was so much higher than the risk identified by the blood test.

DS2 born 19/6/07 and perfect in every way! Remember even if you're an old bag, the odds are still in your favour.

agree fatslag (fab name)

My mw came to tell me about my high risk results and she was telling me that it really was just a numbers game. She'd had women in their forties back with 1/2000 etc. They measure various things in your blood, look at age and weight and the stage in the prenancy-if it's done too early it can come back wrong.

A tribute to Viz magazine. Is that still going?

I'm off to sit on the photocopier and press the green button!

Oooh, so sorry, off topic.