Fetal medicine - small baby

[Thefaceofboe]

I had a growth scan a few days ago at 26 weeks, due to an existing health condition (it’s protocol apparently) and turns out baby is measuring on the 3rd centile. I’ve been booked in for another scan next week but this morning received an appointment with fetal medicine for a couple of weeks times, does anyone know what that is/what my appointment might entail?

Fetal medicine sounds scary

Hi @Thefaceofboe

When I had a fetal medicine Dr appointment, it was just an in-depth scan - much longer than the usual scan. The Dr will measure the baby more thoroughly and they will also look at the baby's development in general to see if there are any other issues underlying.

Try not to worry (as hard as it is..) Some women are just fated to have small babies (as I've been told myself). Is this your first baby?

All the best, hope all goes well for you xx

Thanks so much for replying @SwordPlay

Yes it’s my first baby so extra nervous I suppose! My consultant is really lovely but just kept telling me to wait and see after my scan next week when I was asking questions, so I feel really in the dark about what it could potentially mean.

Chances are it’s just a small baby and nothing to worry about as the scan did show everything was in proportion, just on the smaller side, but you know what it’s like when you get carried away with worst case scenarios.

Baby is already planned to come at 37/38 weeks due to me having a heart condition, so really hope it has a growth spurt sooner rather than later!

@SwordPlay was your appointment due to babies size, or something different?

@Thefaceofboe, My appointment was due to baby's size (with both of my children) - it was really stress-inducing so I feel for you. And, yeah - when they don't answer your questions and just tell you to wait - you're left there, overthinking, googling things - of course you're going to spiral into anxiety pit..!

When they baby is consistently small, they normally want to induce to get them out just after 37/38 weeks but it sounds like you already have plans to have yours at around this time. So hopefully all turns out OK, fingers crossed :-)

I had a scan on my third baby where she measured small, I was told she would be 5-6lb at birth. She weighed 8lb 1! I had lost a lot of weight due to morning sickness and I think screwed the results of the measurements on the tummy as I was literally skin and bone. Try not to worry too much, some babies are just naturally small but go to the scan so they can rule out anything else that could be causing it x