What Prenatal Testing Have You Declined?

[Tummy]

Greetings to all,
after reading a few threads regarding prenatal testing.. the dos and the donts of them. I was wondering how many of us have refused testing during a pregnancy and why, did you get from your care provider for doing what you felt was healthy and right for you and your baby?

[spsmom]

we decline all testing. because we wouldn't do anythign differently if we found out that our child had a deformity or down's or something. it's not like we would abort. if it was meant to be, it was meant to be. and usually the pregnancy naturally miscarries if there is something terribly wrong. so i guess you could say we just trust nature.

[spsmom]

i just wanted to add that we did accept the pku test after ds was born. since the diseases that tests for are usually curable if caught early on.

[Tummy]

My first two preg I was young and completly dumb I must say...

My third preg I did most everything the midwife/ob required but did decline the rogham after birth and pit after birth also.

with fourth preg I did the sugar test then at 28 weeks found out that the birthing center I planed to give birth at did not allow VBACs but did not bother to tell me til that point! sooo I found a LM at 32 weeks into my preg and had a healthy beautiful baby in my bed day after my DD. No rogham druing or after preg.

My last preg was rather rough.. My doctor 'FIRED ME' at 32 weeks because I refused the rogham and sugar test.. he told me he would NOT be my doc if I did not comply with his RULES!! : I had planned a UHVAC but went to the OB for prenatal ( in my area there is NO OB who will even see anyoen for prenatal with out a pre-consent for c/s. and my insurance did not cover a LM) I gave birth in my bed to a beautiful baby girl.. did have a LM there for her birth though, and we are greatful we did.. slight complication after birth but all is well that ends well!!!

[Tummy]

:LOL forgot about that test.. whats it called the tripple screen? I declined it with ALL My babies! and did do the pku with all but the last..
delcined the antibiotics in they eyes for last two.

[wemoon]

I didn't do any testing, but I had a midwife and a homebirth... she encouraged me to not do the testing...

[alegna]

Declined EVERYTHING except urine dips. Got fired from my first midwife because I wouldn't do any GD testing (homebirth midwife, but a CNM) Found my second midwife- she believed in informed consent (imagine that.... ) and had no problem with me refusing things.

Would do the same thing again.

Didn't do PKU either.

-Angela

[liawbh]

With my first, I didn't know any better, had everything the OB rec'd.
This time, I declined the quad screen, the GBS test, and the newborn eye treatment and Vitamin K. I had the three hour glucose screen b/c big babies already run in my family.

My midwives are fine with all of this.

[grisandole]

With ds1 I had most of the tests, because I didn't know any better. With ds2, I had blood work once to determine my blood type, and then just the urine samples. That's it.

Kristi

[Ragana]

I had #1 with an OB and in a hospital, so I had everything, including a false positive AFP test.

With #2, I had a midwife and our homebirth was transferred to a hospital. Prenatally all I had was one blood test, the regular urine tests, and one u/s the midwife's nurse tried to talk me out of (respectfully). I didn't want and didn't have the GD test or AFP test at all. At the hospital we only had the PKU and they made me consent to one heel prick of the baby to test sugar because she was "so big" (8 lbs. 15 oz. hmmmm...). When I say made me, I mean the nurse told me she could be brain damaged if I didn't and this was after 28 hrs. of labor and a transfer, so I didn't argue too much. The pediatrician then called and told them to leave the baby alone when the sugar test came back OK, so they didn't do any more of those. We refused vit. K and the eye stuff for which they made us sign a consent form, which was really no hassle.

[DesireeH]

I declined the triple screen/AFP but I did do the sugar test and puked everywhere both times I tried it. I know I have insulin resistance so it was totally stupid of me to even do the test. Give my poor babe sugar shock. I am not doing that next time, next time I will just eat as if I am diabetic the day I pee on the stick.

[nekochan]

I plan on declining all tests.

[chersolly]

I declined the AFP/Multiple Marker Test. A friend of mine received a false positive result and she underwent an unnecessary aminocentisis, which caused her to nearly miscarry.

[ombra*luna]

I've had sonograms with all three. I had a midwife and was planning homebirths (which didn't happen due to complications), but I also needed an MD for doctor's notes and such to keep things on the up and up at work. It was suggested that I have amnio with all of them, especially the last (since I was 43) but I decided not to. I felt it was too invasive and risky. Also, I would still be having the baby no matter what - I wouldn't have chosen to terminate the pregnancy if I found out something was wrong, so I figured we'd just find out when they were born. (I'm totally pro-choice but my choice, at those points in my life, was to continue my pregnancies.)

[USAmma]

My doctor actually encouraged me to not do the triple screen test unless I felt a need to. I did get the u/s done because some neural tube defects run in the family and I wanted to know for sure what we might be dealing with. GD test because it was painless.

BTW I'm moving this to Birth and Beyond.

[Hayes]

I have ahd an ultrasound at 18 wks to rule out spina bifida. We are planning a homebirth and IW anted to be sure we were safe for that.

I have had very little other testing done. Generic blood counts at 12 and 28 weeks. I think that's all.

[Patchfire]

I had more testing with dd, because it was with a hospital-based CNM group, but still declined AFP. The CNM I saw at 14w was fine with my declining; the dr I ended up seeing at my 18w appointment tried to convince dh and I to go ahead and do AFP, but it wasn't too terribly coercive. :eyeroll

With ds, I had blood work done, and did the urine dips at my appointments, but didn't do any other testing. When I went to the unofficial back-up doctor, he offered me an ultrasound (very casually, I might add, which took me by surprise!), but I declined it.

[eksmom]

We turned down the AIDS test, the CF test, and the AFP test. We were given a really hard time about the AFP by the OB who ended up delivering Emma Kate. We had scheduled a Level II u/s as a way of detecting any problems and we were satisfied with that. The OB disagreed that the u/s would do a good job of detecting problems, and talked about how if we had the results of the AFP when we went for the ultrasound that they would know what to look for, etc. She also gave us a speech about how we'd want to know if there were problems because it would affect where we deliver, etc. She was really nasty about it and basically tried to pull the "if you love this child, you'll have this test" routine.

We would not terminate under any circumstances, and I'm a worrier, so the high false positive rate didn't set well with me.

We did have the GD test (history of big babies plus my mother has Type II diabetes) and the GBS test. I also had rhogam at 28 weeks or so.

There's a lot I didn't know at the time, although my instincts were leading me in the right direction... I questioned some things, but not all. Next time around I will probably be the OB's nightmare, especially here where crunchy only refers to a kind of peanut butter.

[Nankay]

Let's see..I did the urine dip test monthly.. and the gd test....both kids had the PKU test but only after they had been on milk for a week or so. I was told the test wasn't accurate if done before the babe actually had anything to digest. No eye drops, no Vitamin K. No VD testing.

[wasabi]

I had the blood counts and such at the first appointment as well as an STD panel since I was going to be refusing the eye drops which I already knew was going to be hard to do as they're state law here. Did have GD test since midwives recommended it given my history of big babies. If I had failed the one hour then I probably would have refused the three hour but since I've always passed with flying colors it didn't concern me too much. Had second set of bloodwork at same time to check iron etc. Had one u/s at 19 weeks. They recommended a follow-up for something that my research told me was fine so I refused it. Refused prenatal Rhogam but will get it post-natally. Refused all genetic testing. Did do GBS because if I didn't hospital would want to observe the baby for 48 hours to watch for signs of infection. Preferred to just do it and hope for negative which I am. Won't be doing eye drops, vitamin K and will delay PKU until one week old.