Single Umbilical Artery

knottymomma

At my 20 week ultrasound I found out that the umbilical cord only has one artery instead of the normal two. I've looked around and saw it could increase the risks of kidney and heart disease for baby. I go see a specialist on the 18th so I'm not stressing too bad right now. Just curious if any of you other mommas may have experienced this in a previous pregnancy or currently experiencing?

LansL

Hi Knottymomma, we have had two 20 weeks scans now and one of the checks they did was to ensure both Arteries were feeding baby as they thought it may just be one. Our baby has a worryingly low femur measurement so they wanted to check. We do have both arteries do ours is still a little unexplained and we too have an appointment/scan with a consultant on the 18th. It's super scary. I have a mis-shapen uterus and one of their concerns is that baby may already be running out of space to grow (and we are only just over half way!)

Good luck for your follow up appointment, if it makes you feel better the sonographer could not find/measure our second uterine atrtery, the consultant came in to assist with the scan and she managed to find and measure it.

Will you let me know how your scan on the 18th goes please as I'll be thinking about you.

Fingers crossed. Remember there is so much they can help with medically these days as long as these things are picked up early so keep positive xxx

leah665

Good luck to you! I think they'll just want to monitor the growth of your baby closely.

I have some thing called a persistent right umbilical vein. The right vein is supposed to close around 6 weeks and mine didn't. The doctor wasn't too concerned, but of course I went straight to google and freaked myself out.

It'll be ok stay positive! Did everything else on the scan look good?

twogirlsandagreen

My very good friend had this with her son. He was born via c-section (repeat for her) and was 8lbs and PERFECTLY healthy

knottymomma

I will let you all know and hopefully the tech we had just missed it. I actually talked with a nurse in the specialists office and now I'm kind of freaked out. She had said if they find any abnormalities that they will want to check for chromosomal defects such as Trisomy 18, Downs Syndrome, and a few others. That's the scary part to me.

amiejl

We had a two vessel cord with our 3rd, 1 artery. He's 2 now and still awesome and completely healthy. Praying for you!

knottymomma

Thanks!

knottymomma

Baby looked good but stubborn. Couldn't get all the shots of the heart they needed so we go back on July 16 to double check everything. So far no other abnormalities!

Louisl

knottymomma said:

At my 20 week ultrasound I found out that the umbilical cord only has one artery instead of the normal two. I've looked around and saw it could increase the risks of kidney and heart disease for baby. I go see a specialist on the 18th so I'm not stressing too bad right now. Just curious if any of you other mommas may have experienced this in a previous pregnancy or currently experiencing?

They found the same thing at our 20 week scan. They said it occurs in about 2 percent of babies and that the main concern is are they growing enough. But at the same appt they told us he's measuring in the 80th percentile so I'm not too worried. We've already had our genetic testing and have super low risk for genetic abnormalities so that's not a big concern either. We have another ultrasound scheduled at 28 weeks to check growth but that's all.

knottymomma

I'm glad baby is growing and is in the 80th percentile!

megsie3102

When I was born, I had this. It was a few decades ago so they had no idea until I was actually born but then it freaked the doctor out for a few minutes but I was totally fine. I wasn't the biggest baby, 6lbs 14ou but I was healthy.

knottymomma

That's great to hear! I'm already expecting a small baby. I was 6 lbs even and my daughter was 6 lbs 3 oz. I'm thinking this baby will be a little smaller bc of this and the blood pressure medicine.