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Tag: pregnancy

Hosting BBC at City Ultrasound

Written by London Pregnancy Clinic on . Posted in Blog.

Featuring on the BBC ??

We are extremely honoured to have been approached by the BBC to take some stock images and videos for their archive! The BBC producers came across some of our ultrasound images and were ‘really impressed by the outstanding quality and clarity of the images’.

We enjoyed hosting the BBC producers and camera crew at our clinic and talking about the importance of prenatal ultrasound screening and especially Dr Ushakov’s areas of expertise in echocardiography and neurosonography.

This means that going forward you will see our images on BBC news on items related to fetal medicine and pregnancy. We would like to clarify that, to date, City Ultrasound is not related to any of those news items.

What is Nuchal Translucency (NT)

Written by London Pregnancy Clinic on . Posted in Blog.

Nuchal Translucency (NT) 

You probably heard the above term mentioned in the context of pregnancy scans, but what does it actually mean? Nuchal Translucency is a sonographic phenomenon which can be seen best at around 11-13 weeks of gestation. It refers to the thickness of the liquid that can be seen on an ultrasound image behind the baby’s neck.

Why is it important? Research has shown that an increased NT thickness can indicate a higher chance of occurrence of certain chromosomal or structural anomalies. The key word being CAN; in some cases the excess fluid will dissolve further along the pregnancy and the babies will be born completely normal.

The NHS cut off for normal NT thickness measurement is anything below 3.5mm. It is measured as part of the Combined Screening where a blood sample as taken as well to assess the chance of 3 chromosomal anomalies; Down’s Syndrome, Edward’s Syndrome and Patau’s Syndrome. Being a screening test, it is not diagnostic meaning that it cannot give a definite yes/no answer. In case of higher chance results, further investigation is required.

More recently, a new screening test known as Non Invasive Prenatal Test (NIPT) was developed. It involves a simple blood sample taken from the mother’s arm and is capable of detecting Down’s Syndrome with a 99% accuracy, vs 76% accuracy of the Combined Test and 69% accuracy for the Nuchal Test alone. You should take these percentages with a pinch of salt, given Down’s Syndrome in itself is a reasonably rare anomaly which is becoming more likely with age; 1:1250 for a 26-year-old pregnant woman rising to 1:100 for a 40-year-old.

Conclusion:

NT can be a useful indicator for certain anomalies, but should be used very carefully for screening purposes. An increased NT measurement warrants a further investigation such as examination of the baby by ultrasound to exclude certain structural anomalies (especially heart defects) and possibly diagnostic invasive tests such as CVS or Amniocentesis. These invasive tests carry a small risk of miscarriage; an alternative to avoid these invasive test is screening using NIPT such as the Harmony Test.

At City Ultrasound we also perform an examination of the fetal heart (echocardiography) with every scan from 12 weeks, to screen for potential heart defects.

Please note – ultrasound itself cannot exclude all anomalies/complications that can occur during pregnancy.

In the video, Dr Ushakov demonstrates how the NT is measured using ultrasound. This video from 2011 has ~370,000 views on YouTube. Read more about Nuchal Translucency on our website.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9c2LimtE2UY

Ultrasound Gel

Written by London Pregnancy Clinic on . Posted in Blog.

What is it and why do we need it? As you may remember from our post about how ultrasound works, you’ll recall that ultrasound tech utilises sound waves.

Those waves travel through the mother’s tummy and are reflected to the transducer when they reach the surface the clinician would like to examine. Ultrasound waves struggle to travel through air, so when transabdominal ultrasound is performed, we apply a gel to remove any interference from air particles in between the mother’s tummy and the transducer.

This is also the reason why in older ultrasound equipment a full bladder is required to enhance the imaging quality – this is not the case with our advanced Voluson E10!

What are the ingredients you ask? Mainly water and propylene glycol, which is substance often used in food, cosmetics and hygiene products. It is designed to be sticky to allow it to be spread on the tummy without running off.

At City Ultrasound we use a purposely designed ultrasound gel warmer to avoid the unpleasant sensation when a cold gel is applied. Because the small details matter…

Baby Boy or Baby Girl?

Written by London Pregnancy Clinic on . Posted in Blog.

Is it a boy or is it a girl? ♂️♀️???

baby boy example

Can you guess by looking at the above ultrasound image? The gender of the baby can be determined using ultrasound from about 13 weeks of gestation with a high certainty of about 95%. From 14 weeks, the gender can be determined with close to 100% certainty using ultrasound.

Another way the sex of the baby can be determined is through Non-Invasive Prenatal Testing (NIPT) from 10 weeks of gestation – however results typically take 5-7 days to come back from the lab.

At City Ultrasound, we can determine the gender of your baby from 13 weeks upon request. This is included organically in the cost of the scan, however the primary focus of our specialist would be to check the wellbeing and development of your baby. We don’t offer a quick ‘gender scan’ just to determine the sex of the baby

On our website, we have in-depth information about our process and types of scans, but if you do have any questions at all, please feel free to get in touch with us!

✅ Call us on 020 3687 2939

✅ Email us on info@cityultrasound.co.uk 

Birthdays

Written by London Pregnancy Clinic on . Posted in Blog.

In today’s post we’s like to deviate a bit from the usual ultrasound pregnancy scan content to talk about birthdays! As the world is celebrating the birth of 2021 we decided to look at some stats on the ONS website. Ever wondered how common is your birthday?

We looked at some stats from the ONS and about average daily births in England and Wales from 1995 to 2014. It’s not a big surprise that the least common birthdays coincide with national holidays: 26th Dec, 25th Dec and 1st Jan are the least popular birthdays according to ONS data (in this order.)

The curious thing is that the most popular birthday period comes towards the end of September, and in particular September 26th being the most common birthday (followed by September 25th and 24th.) September 26th is 39 weeks and 2 days after Christmas, which is approximately 9 months… Hmmmm, looks like a lot of babies are being made right now during the festive season!

City Ultrasound was born on 12th of April which is the 305th out of 366 in the list. How popular is your birthday? Visit the ONS website to find out!

Source: ONS website. Note that February 29th is actually the least common birthday, but since it only occurs every 4 years the data was adjusted to account for that.

How’s Your Christmas Break Going?

Written by London Pregnancy Clinic on . Posted in Blog.

How is your Christmas break going? We have been going through some of the ultrasound images we took this year and found some awesome images with you! Here’s a fetus in 3D in his mother’s womb at 12 weeks taken on our GE Voluson E10 ultrasound machine. How amazing is this? You can clearly see the baby’s tiny ears, fingers, and the umbilical cord. This particular baby measures less than 5.5cm (~2.1 inches) in this image.

Twin Pregnancy

Written by London Pregnancy Clinic on . Posted in Blog.

Twins

Twin pregnancies can be detected as early as 6 weeks in some cases. However, if you would like to know for sure as well as hear the baby’s heartbeat, you can book a Viability Scan with us from 8 weeks, to:

✅ Estimate the Gestational Age (GA) or the Estimated Due Date (EDD)
✅ Confirm the baby’s heartbeat
✅ Check for twin pregnancies
✅ Verification of normal development of the pregnancy and the baby (embryo)

In the images below you can see:

1️⃣ Twins in a womb at about 8 weeks GA via a standard 2D transabdominal scan. Note that both embryos are about the size of a blueberry at this stage!
2️⃣ A transvaginal (TVS) 3D image of twins in the womb at about 9 weeks GA
3️⃣ A model we have at the clinic to demonstrate the development of twins in the womb at later stages in the pregnancy.

On our website, we have in-depth information about our process and types of scans, but if you do have any questions at all, please feel free to get in touch with us!

Twins with separate placentas at 9 weeks

Merry Christmas From City Ultrasound!

Written by London Pregnancy Clinic on . Posted in Blog.

Merry Christmas ????

Here in the UK we leave mince pies for Santa, unlike the US where children leave cookies and milk. With ~28 million households in the UK, that’s a lot of pies for Santa to get through! But equally, NORAD and Google estimate that Santa will travel 510,000,000 km this year, so we will let him off! What will you leave for Santa this year?

On a more serious note, we’d like to wish all our lovely followers and patients a very Merry Christmas! 2020 has been a very difficult year for all, we sincerely hope that the next one kinder to all of us.

Having only opened our doors to our first patients in April this year, we’d like to thank you all for the overwhelming support. We look forward to seeing more of you in 2021! ⁣

We Are Still Open!

Written by London Pregnancy Clinic on . Posted in Blog.

We are still open! Being an essential medical service, we will continue providing our services throughout the Tier 4 restrictions announced by the government today. Please get in touch with us to discuss your pregnancy scanning needs or book an appointment using our online booking system.

Why Us?

  • Early diagnosis
  • New methods
  • Brain and Heart
  • Expertise
  • Technology
  • Our projects: international top-rated keynote speaker

NIPT: Non-invasive Prenatal Testing

Written by London Pregnancy Clinic on . Posted in Blog, NIPT.

NIPT (Non-invasive Prenatal Testing) is an optional blood test that can be performed in the first trimester from 10 weeks of pregnancy and is used to screen for some genetic conditions. Read more about NIPT:

How does NIPT work?

At City Ultrasound, we offer the Harmony Test, which is an extensively clinically validated type of NIPT. The Harmony Test is able to sensitively screen for:

  • Down Syndrome (Trisomy 21),
  • Trisomy 18,
  • Trisomy 13,
  • Fetal Sexing.

How does NIPT work?

Most of our genetic material (DNA) is contained within our cells; however, a small proportion of this circulates in our blood as cell-free DNA (cfDNA). When a woman is pregnant, the blood also contains cell-free DNA fragments from the placenta, which has a genetic make-up practically identical to that of the developing baby.

By taking a simple blood sample, the laboratory can isolate the cell-free DNA fragments and screen for risks associated with certain genetic conditions.

What can NIPT show me about my pregnancy?

At present, NIPT is an extremely sensitive test for Down’s Syndrome and it performs significantly better than the Combined Screening Test used by the NHS. However, it is important to understand that NIPT is a screening test—this means that it cannot give you a definitive diagnosis or 100% exclude any of the genetic conditions. Its purpose is to estimate whether the baby has an increased or decreased chance of the genetic conditions being tested for.

What are the limitations of NIPT?

As a screening test, NIPT can give an indication of your chance for these genetic conditions, but it cannot be used as a diagnostic tool—further tests would be needed for this. There are also instances where the test gives false-positive or false-negative results, which can give you a false sense of worry or security.

We, at City Ultrasound, strongly believe that the optimal method for checking the health of your baby during the first trimester includes the NIPT and ultrasound scanning (conducted by a specialist). More specifically, we believe that the combination of the Early Fetal Scan and NIPT is the ideal screening option. Of course, no screening program is 100% definitive, but this option allows for a detailed examination of the baby’s physical anatomy, such as the structure of the heart and brain (from the ultrasound), NIPT (as discussed above), as well as the assessment of Nuchal Translucency (NT), which examines the pocked of fluid behind the baby’s neck, giving us more information about the chances of different anomalies. This way we can offer the most information regarding all aspects of your baby’s health.

What’s next?

Normally, a “low chance” result from NIPT is very reassuring, as the test has a high negative predictive value (greater than 99%) for Down’s Syndrome.

As NIPT is not diagnostic, if a result was to suggest and increased chance of chromosomal anomaly, there would be an option to perform CVS (placental biopsy) or amniocentesis. While those are invasive and carry a small risk (0.5-1%) of miscarriage, these tests can give definitive results about the chromosomal abnormalities that may be present. Invasive tests are performed in specialist Fetal Medicine Units of hospitals. The decision to perform the invasive test is something that should be discussed with your healthcare team.

Read more here

Book your NIPT here