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Re: crude measure of fundal height?

From: Alexandra (anonymous@obgyn.net)
Mon, 4 Feb 2002 21:54:24 -0600 (CST)

>
>At Mon, 4 Feb 2002, Jo wrote:
>>
>>I am 30 weeks pg and my ob has never used a tape measure to assess
>>fundal height. He said that for every week after 20 weeks, the FH
>>should be that number of centimeters above the naval and that he is able
>>to assess this by "eyeballing". Is this considered an acceptable
>>measure of FH among Ob-Gyn's? Every layperson's book I have read says
>>that the Dr. should be measuring from the pubic bone to the height of
>>the fundus, using a tape measure. What do most Ob's do?

I posted a message re Size of Fetus. I have recently changed doctors - the first one did not measure the fundal height at all, the second one measured the fundal height from pubic bone to the top of the uterus.

As a general comments, it seems to me that doctors are rather careless about the information they give their pregnant patients. My previous doctor told me at 3 consecutive visits that the baby was in breech position which he said he could tell by palpation of the uterus. In fact when we did an ultrasound at the last visit it turns out she wasn't breech at all and probably never had been. I had worried unnecessarily about the implications of this for the birth. My second doctor has told me that my baby is very large based only on the rough measurement of the fundal height and an ultrasound measurement of the head - given that he really cannot estimate the size of the baby at term based on these two measurements at 34 weeks I question whether he should be making such throw away and worrying comments.

Towards the end of pregnancy doctors should be reassuring their patients to give them confidence to deliver the baby, not worrying them unnecessarily about factors which they can only ascertain roughly by "eyeballing", palpation or making rough measurements. Even the ultrasound from what I have read is highly inaccurate after 30 weeks and it seems to just confuse women as to their correct due date. Previous generations of women have had healthy pregnancies and babies without all this confusing and inaccurate information and technology.

Alex



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