prenatal ultrasound discrepencies..

[ez]

Yesterday I had a 35w 2d ultrasound. The body and femur were measuring 32 w and the head 38w. I had an amnio at 4 months and all was fine. The tech said everything was in normal ranges, and I am right on schedule. She said we are all "proportionally disproportionate" and if something was out of normal range, it would have been flagged. The dr. said all looked good...but still I'm concerned. Does anyone have 3rd trimester U/S measurements to share? My earlier ones were much more on target-thanks!

 

[TinkBoo&ElliesMum]

Oh gosh, my DD was always measuring smaller in body and HUGE in the head!! At my 38 week ultrasound she measured 36w for everything but her head which measured 42w5d!!

She was born weighing 7lbs. 6ozs, 19 inches, and she had a BIG head. She still has a huge head but she's caught up in length, at two and a half she's 40 inches tall and wears a 4t-5t hat! Her dad has a huge head too.

I wouldn't worry about it, they would have told you if it was something abnormal. Some kids just have bigger heads! We're waiting to see if this one got daddy's big head or not!

 

[Hillbeans]

My son was born with a 15" head and at 3 1/2 his head is now larger in circumference than mine at 22.5". He wears adult hats.

My DH has a fairly large head also. Besides the pain of labor (ouch) you should be fine. We had to take him in for a head CT at 8 months old because his head was so large for his body. They ruled out anything abnormal.


LOL - my DH was called "balloon-head" when he was in school.

 

[froglady]

The measurements are approximate; if there had been an "abnormal" discrepency, you would have been told, or further testing would have been ordered.

My daughter had a somewhat smaller head. I was told that she was 2-3 weeks "younger" than what I knew was the conception date. (They assumed that I was wrong) She was born "hypermature" even though I was induced which meant I was right.

The same thing happened with my son; he was the biggest baby in the preemie nursery, even though I had a c-section 4 weeks early.

So the head size can vary from "actual" age, and there may be different growth "spurts" that would affect the results. I was concerned (at one point) that my son might be a dwarf because of this; everything evened out in the end.

 

[MerryPoppins]

My kids both had big heads, especially DD. DH and I both do as well. They would tell you it it was anything to be concerned about.

 

[Keli]

Actually having a big head might be a good thing. I've read that studies have been conducted that seem to show a correlation between larger head sizes and higher intelligence. I'm sure it's not a huge difference or anything but I've always been glad that my dd inherited her dad's big head, lol.

 

[RachelEllen]

Size estimates ultrasounds get less and less accurate as gestation progesses. You can get dates very accurately in the first trimester. But think about it, you can have a 40 week baby who's 6 lbs, or one who's 10 lbs. 35 week U/S are just about useless for estimating dates, and those numbers you mentioning are all within the standard of error to be normal at this age. I wouldn't worry about it at all. If anything were in a pathologic range, they would have flagged it.

 

[christinou]

Both of my girls had big head 15.5 inches.. I was not gaining enough weight with my second one and they did an ultrasound at 32 weeks, to make sure that she was fine. They told me that she would be petite, she was 9 punds 8 ounes at birth, I would hate to know what a big baby would be.......

 

[my3kids]

I was told the early ultrasounds are much more accurate. The late term ones are useful in determining position and such, but the early ones are better at dx. based on the measurements.

 

[browneyes]

The biggest ultrasound discrepency I had was the day before I had my ds, they said he'd weigh less than 8 pounds-probably 7 pounds 12 ounces, and he was 8 pounds 12 ounces. I'll have to look up their ultrasound pics to see if there were any other discrepencies.