Who does the anomoly scan sonographer or doctor

[biscuitsndtea]

I had my anamoly scan. it was done by a sonographer.

I was expecting it to be done by a doctor. I am wondering now if I need to do a private scan to make sure everything is okay ( but the travel is the problem due to recent health complications)

Its an IVF pregnancy. may be I am too cautious, I dont know :)
Was your scan done by a sonographer or doctor ? Please share your experience 😊

A private scan will be less accurate and less informed than a nhs scan in a hospital.

I had lots of scans throughout my pregnancies (and miscarriages), all were done by sonographers-even the private ones.

Sonographer.

I've had maybe twenty scans, all done by sonographers. I'd much rather have the experienced people who do it day in day out, than a doctor just because they are 'senior'!

All done by sonographers, as it should be. It's a completely different skillset to a doctor!

Sonographer. Why do you think a highly trained sonographer who does them day in day out is less likely to know what they're doing than a doctor? I'm sure if they've said it's all good, chances are it is!

As everyone has said, a sonographer will have expertise in doing the scans and knowing what to look for. If there is an issue, the doctor may be needed to discuss the wider implications. The doctor won't do a better job of the actual scanning. Pregnancy can cause a lot of anxiety, but try to be reassured you had a positive scan.

They are best placed to do this. They’ll put anything abnormal in their report and a doctor would further advise you based on this.

They are always done by a sonographer who will refer you to a foetal medicine specialist doctor if there is an inkling of concern over baby. Obstetric sonographers are specially trained in identifying normal anatomy- anything other then you would be referred on to a specialist.

Private scans are performed by sonographers also but there are no regulations for what training they have undertaken and don't usually perform anomaly scans.

An obstetric doctor isn't qualified to perform an anatomy scan unless they also have their sonography training. A sonographer is the person you want performing your anatomy scan.

Out of interest, why don't you trust the sonographer's scan?

In the UK, they're all done by sonographers who are highly trained and do these day in day out. There is no one better placed here to do it.

I did spend my first 26 weeks overseas and scans there were all done by the obstetrician so I understand your question but it's different on the NHS.

Because of when I relocated, I ended up having two anomaly scans. The NHS sonographer was just as well informed and thorough as the overseas obstetrician.

Like others have said it will be a sonographer initially and then a specialist if they notice something that needs investigating.

You do need to take into consideration that ultrasounds are not infallible and up to 50% of congenital defects or anomalies are missed during scanning.

With my last baby the sonographer picked up a cardiac defect and then the consultant couldn't find the pulmonary arteries and then weekly visits to a foetal medical consultant for 6 weeks couldn't give me a definitive diagnosis and we had to wait until he was born.

You definitely want a sonographer not a doctor to do the scan. All my scans were with sonographers except one - I'd gone in for a check up with the consultant (high risk pregnancy) I was 16 weeks and they used the Doppler to find the babies heartbeat. Unfortunately they couldn't find a heartbeat so rushed me over to ultrasound to see what was going on but there were no sonographers immediately available but there was a spare room with a ultrasound machine so the consultant took me in and said she'd scan me to have a look as I have a history of pregnancy loss and was clearly panicking. She started scanning and we saw cheeky baby with perfectly normal heartbeat hiding very low in my pelvis, phew! I asked if she could see anything wrong at all and she said she'd have no idea and that her skill with an ultrasound didn't go much beyond turning the machine on 😂

The sonographer for my 20 week scan was clearly an experienced professional who knew exactly what she was doing.

I had lots of scans with DD (I genuinely couldn't tell you how many) and I can assure you that the sonographers were far better at getting a clear picture - most of the scans were to work out which way round DD was, so the person performing the scan only needed to be able to identify a bottom and a head - one doctor struggled to get a heartbeat (and there were no concerns as to whether DD was alive and healthy). You definitely want a sonographer doing the anomaly scan.

You want a sonographer doing it. It's what they've been to university for. They do them day in day out, and are great at recognising issues.

Two doctors do all three scans (12, 20 &36 weeks) at Kings College hospital, feels a bit overkill, the 20 week one takes ages but I guess it's reassuring too.

Unfortunately the doctors also take the bloods and they're awful at it, would rather walk over to phlebotomy on another site.

Why on earth would a doctor do it? You need a highly trained sonographer.

In my pregnancy with my daughter, a doctor told me she was ectopic - she was not!

You want sonographers doing your scans!

I'm onto my third high risk pregnancy following a late loss in our first pregnancy that was due to our daughter having a chromosome deletion that caused her heart not to fully form.
We were initially scanned by the sonographer, and then past to the consultant who confirmed the problem and passed us onto fetal medicine. In our next pregnancy we had a detailed 16 week scan with the consultant and the 20 week with a consultant. It's only ever the senior consultant who runs a scanning clinic and one time she had the specialist registrar with her as he was going to be training in it.
Due to cord problems, I was scanned twice a week and these were with a sonographer, with the consultant scanning me approximately every 4 weeks to help form the plan for delivery.
This pregnancy we will have two consultant scans to look for abnormalities and then growth scans with the sonographers.
As others have said the sonographers are really highly trained and unless it's a consultant who's specialised then better them than a random doctor. I always find it funny when the midwives can't get an iv line in l, they get the junior Dr who has much less experience in to try.
So please don't worry that it was the sonographer, they're really highly trained.

Exactly. Why would it be done by a doctor?

What's worrying you?

A sonographer is a specialist

Thanks for replying and reassurance. It puts my mind at ease🤗

I had my NIPT scan privately at fetal medicine centre by a Gynae doctor. The doctor was very thorough and was super impressed with the scan compared to my dating scan and other scan I had at NHS. So thought may be anamoly scan is done by a doctor in NHS. Looks like thats not the case in NHS. I am feeling okay since that seems to be general NHS protocol.

Fetal medicine centre is the only private clinic that offers doctors for this

20 week scan is sonographer. If they find issues it’s referred to a specialist. We had the head of obs for Cambridge university do ours! He was wonderful