Contents:
- Medical Video: Prenatal screening, fetal testing, and other tests during pregnancy
- What is a cardiotocography test?
- Do all pregnant women need to take this test in the third trimester?
- How is a cardiotocography test performed?
- What about the test results?
Medical Video: Prenatal screening, fetal testing, and other tests during pregnancy
There are several tests of pregnancy that must be performed by the mother, one of them is the cardiotocography test. Cardiotocography is an examination performed to check the health of the fetus. But do all pregnant women need a cardiotocography test? What should be considered if you want to do a pregnancy check up?
What is a cardiotocography test?
The cardiotochography test is a test that to see the baby's heartbeat is in a healthy condition or not. Usually this pregnancy checkup can also measure whether the movements performed by the baby in the womb are normal or not.
A healthy baby will respond to its movements by increasing its heart rate while moving. The heartbeat will decrease when the baby sleeps or rests.
Normally, a baby's heart rate is between 110 and 160 beats per minute and will increase when the baby is moving. But when a baby falls asleep it usually does not increase the heart rate.
Another goal of a cardiotocography test is to find out whether the baby in the womb is getting enough oxygen or not from the placenta. When the oxygen level is low, the fetus may not respond and show movement normally so it needs further treatment.
Cardiotocography is an examination that is usually recommended when the pregnancy enters the third trimester.
Do all pregnant women need to take this test in the third trimester?
Not all pregnant women need this test. Reported on the Mayo Clinic page, there are several conditions for mothers who are recommended to carry out cardiotocography tests, namely:
- Baby's movements slow down or become irregular.
- Mothers feel there is a problem with the placenta which limits the flow of blood to the baby.
- Little amniotic fluid
- Contain twins and experience complications.
- Having diabetes, hypertension, or heart disease.
- Have complications in a previous pregnancy.
- Rhesus Sensitization, which is when the mother's rhesus group is negative and the baby's blood group has rhesus positive so that there is an attack of antigens in the body that should not occur.
- Delivery time has been delayed for up to 2 weeks
Your doctor will advise you to do this test once or twice a week, or even one every day. It all depends on your health condition and your baby's.
For example, if the doctor suspects that the baby is at risk of not getting enough oxygen, the test can be done every day to monitor it before taking further action.
How is a cardiotocography test performed?
In this test there will be 2 tools that are attached to the abdomen, namely one tool to measure the baby's heartbeat and the other tool will see uterine contractions. Pregnant women must remain seated or lying down during this test. The test will be carried out for 20-60 minutes.
The doctor will find out whether the baby's heart beats faster when he moves in the womb. If within 20 minutes the baby is not active or is sleeping, the test will be extended again in the hope that the baby will be active again to get accurate results.
The doctor will try to stimulate the baby manually or by attaching the device to the mother's stomach which makes a sound so the baby wakes up and moves.
What about the test results?
The results that will emerge from the pregnancy examination are reactive or unreactive. Reactive results show that your baby's heart rate increases in the amount expected during movements in the stomach.
While if the results are not reactive, it means that the baby's heart rate does not increase. This does not increase because the baby is not moving, or there is a problem.
If you have repeated the test along with stimulation so that the baby moves but the increase in heart rate also does not occur (the test results remain unreactive), then this indicates there is a problem that needs to be followed up.
The condition of not increasing the baby's heart rate is a sign that the fetus is experiencing a lack of oxygen so it needs to be examined further whether the baby really lacks oxygen in the womb.
In some cases, if the condition remains unreactive while you have entered 39 weeks' gestation, it is likely that the doctor will immediately recommend early labor.
However, if the gestational age has not reached 39 weeks, the doctor and team will conduct further checks by looking at the biophysical profile and contraction stress test to check what happens in pregnancy.
