Fluid in baby stomach checked 20 week scan

[ALaurB]

I just had my 20 week scan. I do need to go back as the baby position wasn’t good enough to get pictures of the heart. This isn’t concerning to me currently however the sonographer went to check an image of the baby stomach due to the amniotic fluid she has swallowed. He came back and said his colleague said everything looked okay. Has anyone else had this or does anyone know if this is something that actually is okay? It’s triggered my anxiety. Never made it this far in a pregnancy before. I’m just praying for a happy healthy baby.

On my 20 week scan my baby was identified as having an echogenic bowel. They said that this can be caused by swallowing amniotic fluid, especially if there has been any bleeding into the fluid. It can also be a soft marker, generally in combination with others, that can be associated with things such as congenital CMV infection or chromosomal disorders. Although my understanding is that isolated echogenic bowel is not considered to be of significance, only if it is combined with other abnormalities. In fact I think their guidelines advise against even mentioning it if it is isolated, as it causes unnecessary anxiety. Our daughter’s head circumference was measuring small too, so it was mentioned to us as we had 2 non-specific markers.

I don’t know if that’s what the finding was on your scan, but it could be.
Despite our baby having both echogenic bowel and a small head circumference, they were not concerned enough to feel any further testing beyond growth monitoring scans was warranted, and I gave birth to a perfectly healthy baby in September.
It doesn’t sound like your team were concerned by whatever they found. Small imperfections are extremely common at 20 week scans, and most of them are of no clinical consequence and resolve spontaneously. Our baby’s head was on the 6.4th centile at 20 weeks, but was on the 91st at birth! But it is anxiety inducing as your brain naturally runs away with the worst case scenarios, however unlikely they may be.