amnio or not?

[Anonymous]

I am considering on whether I should have an amnio. I am 35 and there are no high risk factors in my family history. With that being said, I am fearful of not knowing possible genetic abnormalties and since the risk is higher in 35+ women, I think I should take the test. On the other hand, if I have it there is a chance of miscarriage. Thoughts?

[Anonymous]

Amnio is incredibly safe--my doctor told me that the stats (and they are positive) are still skewed as they include miscarriages from doctors who do not perform amnios all the time in the mix, also some miscarriages would have happened anyway as there are problems with the baby. My best advice is ..what is your anxiety level? If you don't have one will you stress yourself out the rest of your pregnancy? If the answer is yes, I would go ahead and get it done and have some closure. If you are not an anxious person--your chances of having a baby with a problem are slim since even at 40 you have a 95% chance of having a healthy baby and you aren't 40. Also, the 12 week ultrasound is something like 85% effective in picking up problems. Hope this helps!! For what it's worth, I was in your shoes and opted for amnio since I just couldn't stop thinking about it.

[Anonymous]

At 16 weeks I was 37 years old, I am now 38 and in my 30th week. My husband and I did the genetic counseling and all was well. However, I felt pressured to do the amnio. The genetic counselors as well as my OB (I felt) kept recommending that I do the amnio. Due to my age I felt scared and opted to have the amnio done. I had it done at GW, the docter that performed the amnio was very experienced (we asked how many he had done and does on an annual basis) and their equipment was great. The amnio was terribly uncomfortable though, not to mention very scary. The doctor had a problem with the needle not perforating the sack so he had to jab around there a bit (ouch) and that really freaked me out. At first I was watching the monitor (all the while praying that the baby would stay far away from the needle). After the amnio I was still scared for a couple of days, checking for signs of an infection or anything out of the ordinary. Fortunately for us all was well. Let me just say that after doing all of that I wouldn't do it again. If all the other tests and sonos go well for my next pregnancy are okay I will NOT do another amnio. It really stressed me out having it done. However, it's completely a personal decision and you have to do what's right for you and your partner. Hope this helps.

Best of luck in a healthy pregnancy.

[Anonymous]

Not. Especially if you have a nuchal fold scan, and everything looks good.

[Anonymous]

Gotta give you some more input on what happens. I am a baby--seriously a big baby and I thought the whole procedure was nothing in terms of pain--I've had dental fillings that were ten times worse. If pain is your issue--this is nothing. If something happening to your child is your worry --there is almost no problems if you make sure you go to someone who does this all the time. I had Dr. McClaren at Virginia Hospital Center and he was wonderful. For what it's worth--he gave couseling before we went ahead and told me that while he couldn't 100% say that my baby was healthy before the procedure--he really felt in his medical opinion that she was fine and that the amnio would be really to make sure for me. I wound up leaving without doing it but..a few days later I started to get nervous so he let me come in again and performed it and..as he already had indictated, my baby was perfect. I thought this was interesting because he is not someone who is pushing procedures to up billing--he truly is a good person. Best of luck with your decision, I know this time can be scary!!

[Anonymous]

I posted on the other thread too. I have had 3 pgs with 2 cvs tests and 2 amnios. My first pg, I was 38, and I got the amnio for peace of mind. I totally thought the baby would be ok, but she was not. She had Downs. That was devastating to me, but as we had predecided to terminate in the case of Downs, we did terminate. I went on to get pg again, and then had a cvs test the next time. This time, I had a mosaic result, so needed a follow up amnio. That test was 100% ok, and I went on to have a beautiful baby girl who is now 22 months old. I'm pg again at 43 with baby #2, and had a cvs test with completely normal results. As you can see, I am very much for getting the testing done because it is important for me to know the genetic results. Good luck with your decision, it is very difficult getting through it because of the anxiety, but once you get your normal results, it is a huge load off of your mind for the remainder of the pg.

[Babette70]

One thing that you should know about CVS and amnio is that they do not tell you everything. People like to think that these tests can give comfort or help make decisions. I had a CVS in my first pregnancy and all turned out perfectly. Then my baby died at 29 weeks in utero for unknown reasons. So - if you decide to do an invasive test, which is a completely personal decision, you should go into it with your eyes wide open - mine certainly were not.

[Anonymous]

This is so weird--I just saw this thread in the most recent new threads on this forum, but it looks like this is an old 2007 thread.

It is 2010, and I am trying to decide whether or not to get an amnio. Am 31, got excellent NT results back. I would do it at GW if I did.

It is like the computer gods are messing with me-would prefer not to think about this 100% of my day!

[Anonymous]

I'm 35 and just got great NT results as well - but still very much on the fence about amnio.

[Anonymous]

I had an amnio with my first pregnancy and just had one again with my second (am 18 weeks now). It is such a personal decision but for me, I am SO glad I did it. The risks of anything happening to the baby because of the amnio are extremely low. It was worth it to me to know if the baby had any genetic abnormalities. For us, some abnormalities would have lead us to terminate the pregnancy while other less severe issues would have likely lead us to have the baby. Either way I wanted to know what I was dealing with before the baby was born. There are so many things you can't control and so many things that may go wrong after they're born -- I just wanted to know about the things they could actually test for at this stage. It gave me peace of mind. Stress can also contribute to miscarriage, so that's something to consider.

[Anonymous]

I am 36 and decided to first do the NT and sequential screens. My results came back very promising (1 in 5,500 for Down, 1 in 10,000+ for other trisomies). I opted not to do the amnio, as the Maternal Fetal specialist indicated that with these numbers, the risk of miscarriage is higher than the risk of abnormalities. After my 20 week level 2 US, the risk of Down and other trisomies was downgraded even further. While I know that these results do not 100% guarantee a child with no chromosomal issues, they are good enough for me to sleep soundly.

[Anonymous]

I'm 35 and am not getting an amnio. I did the NT screen and Quad Screen and results were better than for my age. Why do an invasive test after that? Really. My OB even said don't bother.

[Anonymous]

FWIW, I know two women who lost their babies after getting amnios. One had tried to get pregnant for a long time and was barely 34. So tragic. Baby ended up being perfectly healthy. I would not get one unless you had increased risk factors as shown by an NT screen or quad screen. Just not worth it otherwise.

[cmkeough]

I had an amnio with my last pregnancy in late 2007 (I was almost 38 at the time) and had mine performed by Dr. John Larson at GW. He had some difficulty in that the needle had to be manuvered to obtain fluid, and it was extremely uncomfortable. I think the biggest thing was that it was freaking me out as I have a decent threshold for pain. I was extremely stressed about the thought of the needle hitting DD or worse, having a miscarriage.

I vowed if I got pregnant again that I would not do a CVS or an amnio if my nuchal came back fine. Well, FF to 2009/2010. I'm 40 years old and in December I decided to do the amnio again. I didn't feel pressure to get it done (I did more so with my previous pregnancy, by not only my OB but by the people doing the screening). Even though the odds weren't super high that something was wrong, nor was I opting to terminate should the amnio show something, but rather I felt for me that it was important that if there were some genetic abnormalities that I wanted to be prepared as much as possible. Basically it's a personal decision - and no matter what there are risks associated with performing the amnio. I should also mention that with my current pregnancy I had the amnio performed by the same doctor at GW (Dr. John Larson - believe he's the head OB person at GW) and all went well. If you do decide to have an amnio, I would make sure that the person performing the amnio has extensive experience.

CK

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Amnio is incredibly safe--my doctor told me that the stats (and they are positive) are still skewed as they include miscarriages from doctors who do not perform amnios all the time in the mix, also some miscarriages would have happened anyway as there are problems with the baby. My best advice is ..what is your anxiety level? If you don't have one will you stress yourself out the rest of your pregnancy? If the answer is yes, I would go ahead and get it done and have some closure. If you are not an anxious person--your chances of having a baby with a problem are slim since even at 40 you have a 95% chance of having a healthy baby and you aren't 40. Also, the 12 week ultrasound is something like 85% effective in picking up problems. Hope this helps!! For what it's worth, I was in your shoes and opted for amnio since I just couldn't stop thinking about it.

Also, the miscarriage stats from the 70's are still being used, before ultrasounds were used during amnios.