37 and anxiety ahead of combined screening

[CinderRosie]

I turned 37 in the summer and am now 11 weeks pregnant. I don’t have my dating scan for another 2 weeks, when I’m be 13 weeks along and I’m so anxious that I’m going to come back high risk for one of the trisomys because of my age. Especially Down's. Has anyone around my age recently had theirs back and all was ok? I know that anecdotal replies don't change whatever my outcome will be but I can’t shake this feeling that something will be wrong. We had a private scan at 8 weeks and all looked good there but they obviously can’t tell anything from that. Time is dragging so much.

I will be 37 next year when I give birth, the combined screening did highlight a slightly higher risk (1 in 140 for Downs & 1 in 91 for Edwards & Patau). It scared the life out of me but I was then offered the NIPT test which is much more accurate and both have come back extremely low chance. I do think the combined tool is a bit of a blunt instrument and I think if hospitals could afford to offer NIPT to everyone straight off they would. Would save so much anxiety.

Try not to worry unduly OP - remember it's just an indication - and there are plenty of 35+ mums that give birth to healthy babies.

I was the same age as you (now 38, almost 39 with an 11 month old) and I had this exact same anxiety. I felt like because of my age I'd naturally get a high risk result and have to have it investigated. Anyway, I didn't, despite a not low nuchal reading (2.6) my risk came back 1 in 15k for e&p and 1 in 3k for downs. Baby fine!

Hey @CinderRosie
I’m a year ahead of you age wise (was 38 in June) and a week behind you dates wise (10 weeks today).

I went through a bit of a wobble re: screening a couple of weeks ago. Including debating doing private NIPT ahead of the 12 week scan. After quite a bit of reading I’ve come to the conclusion that my combined screening will probably come back high risk, as it sounds like the calculation they use isn’t the most accurate, and age is one of the 3 things that makes up the risk factor. (I think our age already puts us at 1 in 240 ish, and it’s less than 1 in 150 to trigger high risk/more tests)

However, it seems that so many people go from high risk at combined screening to low risk after further tests.

So I’ve kind of accepted it. If it doesn’t happen it’s a bonus, if it does it means we get to have NIPT testing, which is far more accurate than the combined screening calculation.
(And by not doing private testing I’ve saved us £400 which can definitely be spent better elsewhere when it comes to hopefully buying baby stuff!)

Hope that helps x

I'm 38 and it came back 1 in 5000 for downs. My similarly aged friends got low risk results also. I don't think it's a given that you'll have a high combined screening just because of age. I understood from the midwife that it's a combination of nuchal measurement, age, bmi, hcg, Papp A etc.

I had my little boy at the same age as you and came back low risk then also. I did get the Harmony nipt test done privately for that pregnancy, but that was because my scan was almost 14 weeks and so they said it was much less accurate. Came back 1 in 10,000 for downs.

My last baby is now 6 months old. I got pregnant with her at 39. Combined screening was really low, something like one in 20,000. Still went with the harmony for extra peace of mind 😅 though. All absolutely fine ☺️.

I had my DD at 41 and all was fine.

I'm 37 and have just booked a NIPT for when I get to 10 weeks as I just want that extra peace of mind.

I had my first at 37 and my risk for Downs was something like 1:4000. I didn't bother doing NIPT that time.

I'm now 40 and expecting twins and my combined test was 1:2000 for one of them, 1:2100 for the other. I did do NIPT this time (simply to find out their zygosity) and that risk was lower, closer to that of my first DC.

Age is just one of the three factors for the combined test, so much depends on your bloods and the nuchal fold so try not to worry at this point!

38 here, currently 25 weeks pregnant, totally felt the same, debated the private NIPT loads of times but didn't due to the cost of it! Went for my 12 week scan and they couldn't do the NT due to the babies position and I had to wait until 16 weeks to go for the quad test which is meant to be less accurate and more chance of showing high risk due to age, panicked for a week or so... anyway it all came back low risk, the lowest they can report here is 1 in 5000 so I felt reassured by that

Honestly though when thinking if we have another I'll be 40 at least and I think I'd do the NIPT earlier on... it is just a lot of stress for me personally...

I had mine at 38 and 42. Paid for a private NIPT at 10 weeks both times, all was fine and worth it for me especially as it tells you the sex accurately too.

I'm 37 and 13 weeks pregnant. I decided to have a private NIPT test at 10 weeks as I didn't want to risk getting a high combined screening result and then worrying unnecessarily. Fortunately all the results were good and it has the added advantage of finding out the sex early if you want that (you don't have to find that out if you don't want to).

I'm 37 and currently 20 weeks pregnant. My result for both tests was 1 in 5,000 so our age doesn't automatically mean a problem. I know the days can drag but try to stay positive if you can!