The new trend in finding out your baby's gender.

Congrats Becky! What happy news for your family!


Now, as to the safety or harmfulness of ultrasounds, do you have some sources for that? I've looked up some stuff, since it's been a while since I had kids and looked into this, and can't find anything scientific that supports the conclusion that ultrasound is dangerous or is associated with any risk of increase in disease incidence. There are cautions about the new 3D and 4D machines being of higher power, and the official recommendation is to limit ultrasounds to medically necessary application only, which is always a sound, safe policy. I'm only going to copy two of the studies I briefly scanned the info on (there are many more); I like this first one because it is a review of all of the studies out there (as of 2009) so it can look at the big picture of the data. The second is an opinion piece from the same journal issue discussing the potential issues that do exist. Unfortunately, the studies that looked at ultrasounds and autism had no abstract available so I had to buy the articles to see the results (at $30+ a pop, I can't afford to do that), but many of the studies looking at cancer and ultrasound exposure were all negative for correlation. If you'd like to search yourself, go to http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/ then type in whatever keywords you are hoping to find - I tried prenatal ultrasound risks, prenatal ultrasound safety, and prenatal ultrasound autism.

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1 ... .6328/full
Safety of ultrasonography in pregnancy: WHO systematic review of the literature and meta-analysis
M. R. Torloni,*, N. Vedmedovska, M. Merialdi, A. P. Betrán, T. Allen, R. González, L. D. Platt
Article first published online: 17 MAR 2009
DOI: 10.1002/uog.6328

...we conducted a systematic review and meta-analysis to evaluate the safety of human exposure to ultrasonography in pregnancy.

A systematic search of electronic databases, reference lists and unpublished literature was conducted for trials and observational studies that assessed short- and long-term effects of exposure to ultrasonography, involving women and their fetuses exposed to ultrasonography, using B-mode or Doppler sonography during any period of pregnancy, for any number of times. The outcome measures were: (1) adverse maternal outcome; (2) adverse perinatal outcome; (3) abnormal childhood growth and neurological development; (4) non-right handedness; (5) childhood malignancy; and (6) intellectual performance and mental disease.

The electronic search identified 6716 citations, and 19 were identified from secondary sources. A total of 61 publications reporting data from 41 different studies were included: 16 controlled trials, 13 cohort and 12 case-control studies. Ultrasonography in pregnancy was not associated with adverse maternal or perinatal outcome, impaired physical or neurological development, increased risk for malignancy in childhood, subnormal intellectual performance or mental diseases. According to the available clinical trials, there was a weak association between exposure to ultrasonography and non-right handedness in boys (odds ratio 1.26; 95% CI, 1.03-1.54).

According to the available evidence, exposure to diagnostic ultrasonography during pregnancy appears to be safe.

Here, the concerns are addressed openly, and risks of disease development are not in the list. Prospective patients should become fully informed, have the procedure done only if medically necessary, and make sure that they have a competent technician - all sound advice for any medical procedure, but nothing that warrants extra concern of harm that I can find.
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1 ... .6381/full
Opinion
Ultrasound is not unsound, but safety is an issue
K. Å. Salvesen1,*, C. Lees2
Article first published online: 28 APR 2009
DOI: 10.1002/uog.6381

Ultrasound has an extraordinary safety record. It has been used in obstetrics for almost four decades with no proven harmful effects. In this issue of the Journal there is an updated review of the epidemiological literature. The authors conclude that exposure to diagnostic ultrasound during pregnancy appears to be safe. So why is safety of ultrasound an issue; or is it an issue?
• We do not know that modern ultrasound devices are safe
• Ultrasound operators do not know how to use the real-time display of safety information on the screen
• Doppler is used in the first trimester in normal pregnancies
• Journal policy on publishing reports of first-trimester Doppler ultrasound research is not followed
• There is a possible link between experimental and epidemiological evidence on ultrasound and handedness
• Is ‘souvenir scanning’ a problem for the future of ultrasound?
• Where do we go from here?
There is no such thing as zero risk, and absence of evidence of harm is not equivalent to evidence of absence of harm. More research is welcomed, but the time has passed when randomized controlled trials with ‘ultrasound free’ control arms could be done. As professionals involved in ultrasound, we must regulate ourselves sensibly—or else someone else is likely to. We owe it to our patients, to unborn babies and to the future of ultrasound.

hvgal wrote: Science chic, while I appreciate you sharing an alternative view point I must say that if you seach on government websites you will only find out what the government wants you to know. In this case, they definately don't want you to know that they have known for years the harmful effects of ultrasound. When it was originally introduced Japan refused to use it because it was found to cause chromosonal damage. Now we are seeing the babies of those first ultrasound bablies and the insidence of "disease" related to chromosonal damage is skyrocketing. A coincidence? I think not. If you Google (or whatever search engine you use) ultrasound and safety or autism you will find much more information. Sadly and especially when it comes to women's health, the government is not who you want to rely upon.

hvgal, I appreciate you sharing an alternative point of view as well, and I'm not one to just automatically pooh-pooh unconventional points of view, as the basis of new ideas often starts as notions that are scoffed at. However, I also do not accept only opinions/anecdotal evidence on a claim - there must be credible, independent, duplicated double-blind placebo controlled studies showing evidence of said claim. So the papers that I cited are posted on government sites because the funding for them came from the government, but the research is from independent scientists. Thousands of them, from around the world. Scientists are not the manufacturers of the machines, nor profiting off of their use - they have no financial stake in "pushing" ultrasounds (and, indeed, do not - they aren't recommended unless medically necessary) to question their results and policies set forth to date, and they are always reviewing new concerns - how do you see a conspiracy in there?

Ultrasounds have been used for 40 years now, and there's not been any correlation seen between babies who were exposed and babies who were not in terms of disease rates, malformations, or genetic defects. Sounds waves cannot break apart DNA unless they are extremely powerful, because they have to pass through the mother's skin, muscle, and fat tissue, and then the baby's as well before getting to the DNA inside the cells, and that's not the settings for the older models (and, also, shouldn't we be seeing increases in skin or other types of cancer starting in the abdominal region in moms who get them? That would be worth researching. I don't recall seeing anything about that, but haven't looked specifically). The newer models are a cause for some concern, since they are more powerful, as is getting multiple ultrasounds, and that is pointed out in the "government" study that I cited - if they were trying to cover up danger, why would they list all of the concerns? Or keep researching to uncover possible dangers that would necessitate changes in recommendations?

If you want to look for causes of chromosomal damage, there are plenty of exposures that people have every day, and have been getting more of over the decades - toxins breathed in, chemicals added to our foods, more people using air travel, more people getting MRIs, PET scans, x-rays, etc that are lot more plausible, and have data backing up their effects. Sounds waves just don't have the oompf. I did Google ultrasounds and autism, and much of what I found is from questionable sources, or alternative medicine sites that also have agendas, and no evidence to back up their claims. Again, I'm happy to accept scientific studies on this, so if you could find some, I'd love to read them! The case against ultrasounds certainly isn't laid completely to rest, and that's why studies on their safety are still on-going, but it's a pretty safe bet, after thousands of studies, that ultrasounds are not the cause of the increases in cancer or autism seen.

Absolutely everyone must be their own advocate for their health, but to just cut out completely one side of the spectrum of information - the government - because you don't trust "the government", if that's the case, is to not keep an open mind, but ignore reliable, good information from independent experts who don't have an agenda other than to improve people's lives and health, and who's data is at least worth an examination. It is up to each and every one of us to critically examine the evidence at hand, and decide what's best for us, and to do so means looking at information from every kind of source, not just the ones you necessarily would agree with first.

At least, that's how I do it - I am a fan of both traditional and alternative medicine as I see strengths and weaknesses in both, and will study the data from each and base my health decisions on the merits of each. I do not deride alternative medicine just because there is less scientific evidence for its benefits, as that is often the result of traditional medicine still playing catch-up in accepting and testing alternative therapies, but I also give it less credibility at the same time because it isn't always proven to be effective (and even then, it's likely a case of the effects are so subtle that they cannot be teased out in a small scientific study - traditional research still has a ways to go in determining what works and what doesn't). In doing so, I think that I give myself the best chance at success in taking care of myself and dealing with any health issues that come up. I'd ask that you please give traditional sources of information as much consideration (but, again, that's up to you), just know that on something like this, I want everyone who reads here to get both viewpoints so I will find what evidence I can that supports what I've learned, but am open to changing my mind if it's proven otherwise!