14 weeks and low PAPP A

[hannah345]

Hi everyone, I'm looking for some advice, words of wisdom... anything that will ease my anxiety!
I got told yesterday that I have low PAPP A, midwife has now put me on asprin and basically told me what it means, I'm so so worried that this baby won't make it to the end. I'm trying to stay positive here but the information I heard yesterday is playing in my mind! Midwife told me extra scans and close monitoring will be available to me which is good.

Has anyone had this before and was fine?

Hiya xx I had low Papp A and everything was absolutely fine. I had the extra growth scans (11 in total!) and I was also offered an early induction in case baby was small (she wasn't)

I am not a medical person but from what I can gather low Papp A either means something or it doesn't, ie either causes problems or doesn't

So grateful for the extra scans and the NHS keeping an extra eye on baby but to be honest I had other friends who would go to scans and be told baby is measuring big or small and that's without low Papp A!

Baby came, she was 3.1kg and she is now 3 years old and everything has been wonderful (of course I am also always tired) hopefully it will be the same for you OP xx

Hi, 23 weeks here and have low papp-a, also been on aspirin since 13 weeks. Totally understand your anxiety, I felt the same. I now feel a lot better about it after some time and learning more about it. It's a risk factor for all the things mentioned by the midwife, not a diagnosis. There is also a really good support group on facebook where literally 9/10 stories are positive and people weren't affected. I'd recommend joining it. I have growth scans from 32 weeks but so far everything is perfect and baby was measuring fine on his 20 week scan. To be honest a lot of midwives etc. don't even bat an eyelid about it - when I saw my community midwife the first time after the diagnosis, I was the one to mention it, not her, and she didn't really have anything to say! A lot of hospitals don't even tell people if they have it either.

Yes, I had low PAPPa - I think about 0.16MOM. If you search for threads on here most pregnancies where this is detected have no problems whatsoever. In our case I got HELLP syndrome (a separate issue though low PAPPa can indicate increased likelihood of placental problems) and DS was a little bit growth restricted when he was born, but he's a healthy 8 year old now. Taking aspirin should help and there is a very good chance that all will be perfectly fine. You should get extra scans in late pregnancy to keep track of growth and pick up any problems early.

This has just reminded me that I had a low papp A score with DS2. I had completely forgotten! There were no issues for him and he ended up measuring so big that there was talk of a planned C-section. In the end he came two weeks early bang on the average weight. The extra monitoring was great - I got to see him loads before he came. I remember there was a great FB group that was full of pictures of very healthy low papp-A babies that was very reassuring.

Thank you all so much! Very helpful xx

I had low Papp a. Baby was born at 40+6, 7lb 13. No issues at all. I second the Facebook page, extremely supportive and informative. I was so stressed all pregnancy but wish I hadn't been so worried!

Can anyone tell me what the Facebook page is called so I could take a look? X

Low Papp a pregnancy support group

Im 25 weeks and have low PAPP-A. Saw the consultant a couple of weeks ago and she said its basically an indicator of a potential issue, but by no means a certainty. She told me not to work on the assumption the baby would be small, and the extra growth scans are precautionary and most people with it have very few problems. As long as all growth scans are good (which they are for the majority) the only difference it will make is they'll want to induce at 40 weeks

I was the same as you early on though and really anxious. Now I'm more reassured and jusy appreciating the extra scans and monitoring for the just in case