Quad screen- false positives

dougsbug · April 2010

My ob mentioned false positive potential- how frequent have you heard them to be? Has anyone had a false positive- do you deliver before you learn it's false, or are there subsequent tests? Just trying to decide whether to test or not.

kinserella · April 2010

I choose to do the quad screen with all 3 of my pregnancys, and I was informed of the false positive as well. I never had the test come back with any false positives, thank goodness! but i do know that if you do, then they will do an extensive ultrasound, and possibly an amnio. Scary stuff, huh?

You could get a false positive, but after the other tests, you will know if those false positives are confirmed or not, then you can be better prepared for when the baby gets here, if there is something wrong. God forbid there is, but it does happen. its a personal choice, whatever you decide. Take care!

mrs.kapow · April 2010

From what my doc told me and what I read online, the quad screen has the lowest rate of false positives when looking at the combined results (AFTER your 20 wk test can be looked at in conjunction with your 12 wk test).

We did it so we could be fully prepared.

Here's a little more info:

https://www.americanpregnancy.org/prenataltesting/quadscreen.html

superace27 · April 2010

a teacher I work with had a false positive early on, not sure which test, but then had an amnio later and learned it was false. delivered a healthy baby boy

BarbieNCSU · April 2010

I was warned about false positives by my OB as well as a friend. My friends SIL had received a fp and it completely stressed her out the entire time they were doing additional testing. I still chose to do the quad only because I felt like if they found something that was treatable or untreatable I would want to know before hand and be prepared just in case. In my situation we did get a false positive and although it was scary we ended up with a really great fetal specialist. In addition, he found that my false positive revealed that they needed to watch my placenta for possible issues and that I may deliver much ealrier than normal - so if I had not gone through additional intensive ultrasounds I would have no idea.

DH claims if we have another baby he wouldn't want to go through the stress again, but I still think having the quad done was worth the scare.

eris1995 · April 2010

The quad screening tells you what your potential risk is in a percentage. It's not exactly a false positive - but some people have been told that there is a higher change of down syndrome and everything ends up fine with their baby.

Dobie_Mama · April 2010

eris1995:
The quad screening tells you what your potential risk is in a percentage. It's not exactly a false positive - but some people have been told that there is a higher change of down syndrome and everything ends up find with their baby.

Ditto all of this.

sweetidrider22 · April 2010

I know the test can be inaccurate, and can miss downs syndrome all together (rare probably but since I have a friend who it happened to so it seems really likely to me). I told my doc I only wanted to know if there was anything that was treatable (like spine deformities) but everything else I didn't want to know, and it has given me peace of mind.

Pumpkin&Roo · April 2010

I think the rates of false positives have gone down now that it's a multi-part test. When we had DD 3 years ago, my OB practice didn't do the NT scan at all because they felt the rate of false positives was so high. Now they do it and you can choose whether to have it combined with one or two blood draws to give it the most accuracy. I think the accuracy was more than 90% with one blood draw, which is what we did.

chrisantma · April 2010

I had a false positive with my son, I did choose to have an amniocentesis. My sister also just went through this, but they were ablwe to rule out the possibility of down syndrome by doing a level two ultrasound and a fetal echo cardiogram.

Best of luck to you!

firsttogo · April 2010

We had a false positive, and decided against further testing. We will not be having the quad screen this time.

ColieJ · April 2010

dougsbug:
My ob mentioned false positive potential- how frequent have you heard them to be? Has anyone had a false positive- do you deliver before you learn it's false, or are there subsequent tests? Just trying to decide whether to test or not.

there were a few on our board that came up with very high risk for DS or T13 but after their amnio/CVS all were found to be not present.

Want a personalized experience?

Quad screen- false positives

Re: Quad screen- false positives

Choose Another Board

Search Boards