The Results Call

My doctor from St. E.'s (Dr. Khawli, the high risk pregnancy doctor) called me to give me the results of the prenatal genetic screening. There is a 1 in 78 chance that we may have a baby with a genetic disorder such as Down's Syndrome. This is considered a high risk. Dr. Khawli said that this gives us cause to have an amniocentesis. What is an amniocentesis? In a nutshell, a needle is inserted into the uterus to extract amniotic fluid that is then sent to the lab where it can be determined with 98%-99% accuracy if the baby has a genetic abnormality or disease. It can also determine other things, such as paternity, and lung development.

What are your options? Finding out your baby does not have a genetic disorder can give you peace of mind. Finding out your baby does have a disorder can give you time to prepare to care for a special needs child or to terminate the pregnancy. You can terminate the pregnancy up to 24 weeks.

Frank is kind of worried. He wants us to get the amniocentesis done but I don't really want to do it. I feel like the risk of losing the baby is too great. Miscarriage is the primary risk related to amniocentesis. The risk of miscarriage ranges from 1 in 400 to 1 in 200, depending on how regularly the hospital performs the procedure. Miscarriages can occur because of infection in the uterus, the water breaks or labor is induced prematurely. We will see Dr. Khawli, the high risk pregnancy doctor, on May 22nd. He said we can do the amnio then or we can do it before then if we're really nervous. We will definitely have another ultrasound on that day and we may find out the sex of the baby! How exciting. Frank has that day off, so we're going together. We're thinking about the amnio. We're going to talk about it, educate ourselves, and pray. Remember, this is our little miracle and I do have faith that everything will turn out okay. Stay tuned for an update. Next doctor's visit: Monday, May 4th. To Dr. Malak, my regular Ob doctor. Read more about amniocentesis at: http://www.americanpregnancy.org/prenataltesting/amniocentesis.html