Healthy Care Program: Nearly all pregnant mothers have at least one ultrasound during the course of their pregnancies

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THE USES OF ULTRASOUND

Ultrasound is all about sound waves. Your care provider or a sonographer uses a handheld device called a transducer that transmits high frequency sound waves through your abdomen. When those sound waves reach an object (in this case your baby), an "echo" is created, where the waves bounce back, showing up as an image on the screen.

A transvaginal ultrasound is used in the first trimester as early as five and a half weeks gestation to confirm your pregnancyand determine gestational age. In your second trimester, an ultrasound can look at your baby's development or serve as a follow up to other prenatal tests. Late in pregnancy your provider may use ultrasound to determine your baby's position or to check the baby's lungs for maturity. Most mothers have at least one ultrasound during pregnancy.

Estimating baby's weight via ultrasound is not an exact science. It takes into account head, abdominal, and thigh (femur) measurements to arrive at an estimated weight of your baby. These measurements are occasionally quite accurate, but other times they're not. Any weight estimation by ultrasound can be as much as a pound or more off your baby's actual weight. Often your care provider can more accurately estimate your baby's size by examining your belly.

We do not know conclusively the safe levels of ultrasound. What we do know is that early studies on animals showed cell damage when high levels of ultrasound were used, although these levels were much higher than those used in humans. Most experts recommend that the less ultrasound exposure to the baby, the better.The National Institutes of Health (NIH) recommends that "ultrasound examination in pregnancy should be performed for a specific medical indication."