Should prenatal testing be routine for all pregnant women?

Blog #6
Prenatal Testing
Well I could discuss this topic for days! One of the reasons is that all test have their risks. Urine test really are not as high on the platform of risks, but taking blood can introduce bacteria into ones bloodstream and start a whole chain of problems; however, we do have a team of antibiotic to ward off such infection, but this still goes into the bloodstream and the infant does get a dose too.

Next we have the ultrasound procedures. With ultrasound you have some risks the level of exposure in very small amounts of radiation. The exposures to radiation are very small, but still you are exposing radiation, which are accumulative of through out ones lifetime. But that is if you a frantic hung up on radiology!

Now the prenatal testing is the taking of amniotic fluid during the gestation of the pregnancy. The reason is it’s one of the most serious procedures that a woman has to make. It may be simple for a Doctor to perform in his office; however, it has very serious risks behind it. One it can induce the onset of labor, can induce a bacterial infection to the woman and the infant. There are many factors that one has to choose to decide on this procedure. Pregnancy is first already a physically and emotional time throughout the three trimesters.

Now sharing my own personal views on it, I didn’t chose to do one on my first pregnancy because I was very healthy. On my last two pregnancies I was much older. The reason for this procedure wasn’t because I worrying over the possibility of having a Downs Syndrome infant, but rather that I could not survive the physical stress on my heart and kidneys. I actually had several Obstetricians refuse to take me because I was so high risk. But eventually I found a young doctor who took me on and make me feel safe through out these last two babies.

On the my delivery dates for both babies at about the eight month for each infant, they started drawing the fluid to determine if they could survive outside of the womb. The test they were looking for the development of their lungs or fetal lung maturation. On both babies every week I went in his office to have this test preformed; however, on each one of the test I started having some minor labor pains, but my body managed to not go into labor. But on both babies when I had the third amnio synthesis test, I started into labor and was admitted into the hospital for my cesarean section. They are considered premature infants and I have had to deal with developmental issues with these children. So as with any test or procedure, one should weigh the pros and cons and I'm a firm believer in most tests during pregnancy.

But in all it was well worth it!