When you first become pregnant you will be offered various screening tests to check on your health, and the health of your baby. Being screened is entirely your choice and you will be provided with plenty of information to help you decide. You can go to this website and your midwife will give you a leaflet called “Screening tests for you and your baby”.
This timeline provides a really useful summary of all the screening tests that will be offered to you. You will see that there are blood tests and ultrasound scans and if you have diabetes there are some additional eye screening tests.
As you can see from the timeline, most of the tests are concentrated in the first half of your pregnancy as the aim of the screening programme is to identify whether you or your baby is at an increased risk of a disease, or developing a condition or complication.
If necessary, we can then provide information, further testing or appropriate treatment so that you can reduce the risks of any complications arising from the disease or condition. However, establishing the sex of your baby is not part of the national screening programme so please don’t expect to find this out as a result of your tests.
When you first meet your midwife, please make sure that you have a note of the date of the first day of your last period as this will help us to plan your care and screening programme. Remember, it is up to you to decide whether you want any scans or tests and please do ask if you have any questions.
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