Amniocentisis............

missnurse01, MSN, RN · Jul 15, 2004

hey uk

funny you wrote this-i just had an amnio yesterday! this is the second one that i have had done, first was on pregnancy #2 at 34 weeks for lung maturity, this one i am almost 30 weeks and its for chromosomal stuff (baby had nuchal fold, quad screen neg, i'm 28). this is a bit late for growing the chromosones-i guess it takes longer now and they still may not grow. anyway, the genetic counselor said that a level 2 u/s and amnio around 20 weeeks was the ideal time-but i wanted to wait for the amnio b/c of risk for miscarriage, i have a very strong preterm labor risk and was already on bedrest and meds at that point and didn't want to push it...didn't know it wasn't wise to wait! they didn't really convey that. anyway, it's not bad-a lot less painful than an iv to me...yest they monitored me for 2 hours b/c of my hx and i had to take an extra tocolytic but got to go home and all is well. that has been my experience anyway...good luck to you with procedure and decision...i don't believe that the risk of miscarriage is really high-but i don't remember the figures off the top of my head.

danaRN2b · Jul 15, 2004

I had an amnio with my third child, (due to weird blood test results they wanted to rule out Down's Syndrome) and it didn't hurt at all. They didn't use one of those big, huge needles they show in the movies...the needle was about four inches long. They did the ultrasound first, then kept it on so the doctor could see where she was when he did the needle stick. I barely felt it. In fact, if I hadn't been watching, I might not really have known when he did it. It was not traumatic at all & not painful, and I felt a million times better after the results were back and showed that my daughter was perfectly healthy and normal. I wouldn't hesitate to have it done. Good luck to you in whatever you decide.