Possible negative effects of u/s

inamra · November 2010

Just ran into this article on u/s today while I was trying to read up more on the airplane scanners. Not sure how conclusive it is (and it's on mice and not humans) but just some food for thought...I do believe there is more room for further studies on u/s and/or other imaging modalities (like airport backscatter imaging and its effects on infants/children esp since they're smaller/more susceptible).

ETA: It's actually a paper, not so much an article...

MauiBride2008 · November 2010

See, this is where I'm totally nervous. I have to go every 2 weeks for an internal/external u/s to measure my cervical length until I'm 32 weeks. I can't help but be paranoid that this isn't a good thing for my LO

MauiWedding08 · November 2010

MauiBride2008:
See, this is where I'm totally nervous. I have to go every 2 weeks for an internal/external u/s to measure my cervical length until I'm 32 weeks. I can't help but be paranoid that this isn't a good thing for my LO

this is where you weight pros/cons. I think many people on this board know my inclination to no interventions but if a medical professional I trusted convinced me many ultrasounds would be a good thing and the benefit would help ensure me and baby were healthy and allow them to prepare for xyz possibility then I would be on board no questions asked.

Unfortunately there are many health care professionals that just do a ton of unnecessary tests to cover their own butt and the general public has somehow equated lots of ultrasounds/tests/etc as a measure of good care. I just don't understand the doctors that contribute to this phenomena, I always see people bragging about how many ultrasounds they *get* w/out any medical necessity.

lelekay · November 2010

MauiWedding08:
Unfortunately there are many health care professionals that just do a ton of unnecessary tests to cover their own butt and the general public has somehow equated lots of ultrasounds/tests/etc as a measure of good care. I just don't understand the doctors that contribute to this phenomena

I do!!!! Sorry if I offend, but to everyone that doesn't understand why doctors order so many tests, but I get it 100% and then some.

As a doctor's wife, I thank God that MH orders so many tests. Because....if a patient asks about a test (or even doesn't ask, but finds out about it later) and he doesn't give it....and then they have a complication that could have been prevented (even if there's only a very small chance of it)? There goes our house, our car, our son's education......basically our entire livelihood as a family when that patient sues MH for millions of dollars. Yes, doctors do cover their butts....they absolutely have to. If MH loses his license because of even just one crackpot who sues him for not being ultra-conservative and ordering every test possible, our family is completely screwed financially. We'd still have to somehow pay the ridiculous student loans he has that paid for that medical license, but there'd be no way to do that without the license to make any money. He's just looking out for his family.

Sorry to get on my soapbox, but everyone loves to complain about doctors these days. Sure there are some bad ones out there, but most are just doing what they have to to survive in our super-litigious society. Don't look at the doctors themselves, look at our medical legal system as for what needs to change.

With that said, if a patient is educated about it and doesn't want certain tests, you just have to sign paperwork saying that you don't want it. But I agree that you can't just trust that every test is necessary. You must educate yourself, then I agree that you must weigh the pros/cons for each individual situation.

MauiWedding08:
I always see people bragging about how many ultrasounds they *get* w/out any medical necessity.

I do agree that this never made sense to me. While I loved seeing my little one before he was born, I didn't want to over-do it. While ultrasounds seem perfectly safe, I do think erring on the side of caution is probably good.

MauiWedding08 · November 2010

lelekay:

I do!!!! Sorry if I offend, but to everyone that doesn't understand why doctors order so many tests, but I get it 100% and then some.
As a doctor's wife, I thank God that MH orders so many tests. Because....if a patient asks about a test (or even doesn't ask, but finds out about it later) and he doesn't give it....and then they have a complication that could have been prevented (even if there's only a very small chance of it)? There goes our house, our car, our son's education......basically our entire livelihood as a family when that patient sues MH for millions of dollars. Yes, doctors do cover their butts....they absolutely have to. If MH loses his license because of even just one crackpot who sues him for not being ultra-conservative and ordering every test possible, our family is completely screwed financially. We'd still have to somehow pay the ridiculous student loans he has that paid for that medical license, but there'd be no way to do that without the license to make any money. He's just looking out for his family.

I can see that. And I understand, it's a problem with the whole system sorry it came across me saying doctors are the only problem. The med-mal arena is a scary place. Huge amounts of money are doled out by lay juries that are easily swayed by sympathy and highly technical info presented by unscrupulous lawyers and their medical "expert" side kicks (that are also primarily in that business to profit).

HappyGoLuckyGal · November 2010

MauiWedding08:

I can see that. And I understand, it's a problem with the whole system sorry it came across me saying doctors are the only problem. The med-mal arena is a scary place. Huge amounts of money are doled out by lay juries that are easily swayed by sympathy and highly technical info presented by unscrupulous lawyers and their medical "expert" side kicks (that are also primarily in that business to profit).

Thank you for the clarification. I read the post earlier but didn't reply. My malpractice insurance premiums are very expensive because I'm a high-risk specialist. I don't use it as an excuse to order unnecessary tests, but I do think about how my license and livelihood could be put at risk at any time by even the most frivilous lawsuit. It's hard to not practice defensively.

HappyGoLuckyGal · November 2010

Sorry. Multiple post error.

inamra · November 2010

HappyGoLuckyGal:
MauiWedding08:

I can see that. And I understand, it's a problem with the whole system sorry it came across me saying doctors are the only problem. The med-mal arena is a scary place. Huge amounts of money are doled out by lay juries that are easily swayed by sympathy and highly technical info presented by unscrupulous lawyers and their medical "expert" side kicks (that are also primarily in that business to profit).

Thank you for the clarification. I read the post earlier but didn't reply. My malpractice insurance premiums are very expensive because I'm a high-risk specialist. I don't use it as an excuse to order unnecessary tests, but I do think about how my license and livelihood could be put at risk at any time by even the most frivilous lawsuit. It's hard to not practice defensively.

Honestly, I'm a better-safe-than-sorry type of person myself so I would most definitely get the tests I needed to make sure something wasn't serious. When I was young, I once had a dr who told me to just go home and rest cuz I just have the flu even though I had an unwavering medium-high fever for a week. My mom ended up insisting that I get more tests and it turned out I had pneumonia. So, I'm glad my mom demanded the tests and although it was more medical intervention than even what the dr suggested, it caught something fairly serious. Doctors have to use their medical experience and discretion to what they order for their patients and some patients may disagree with their judgement. That's why we at least can choose our primary care doctors (and get 2nd opinions), so that if you don't see eye-to-eye with them, you can see one who you trust and/or is more in line with your views.

inamra · November 2010

lelekay:
MauiWedding08:
I always see people bragging about how many ultrasounds they *get* w/out any medical necessity.
I do agree that this never made sense to me. While I loved seeing my little one before he was born, I didn't want to over-do it. While ultrasounds seem perfectly safe, I do think erring on the side of caution is probably good.

This is actually the original reason why the paper caught my eye. I had an opportunity to get free 3-D u/s for LO when I was pg and whereas I wanted the u/s pics pretty badly, MH was pretty against it because he was afraid that the u/s waves may have unknown effects on a fetus. Now if my OBG (who I like a lot and trust) suggested that I needed additional u/s, I would do it in a heartbeat but even she suggested not doing more u/s unless medically needed. So I ended up not getting them and I'm glad I didn't now, especially since they were gonna do them up to 2-3 times a week (if my schedule allowed it...and I was just gonna pretend that my schedule only allowed for me to do it once) and it would be an hr every session. I knew of people who were thrilled and ended up going every week which made me kinda nervous for them at the time, but I didn't know of anything published on possible studies of negative effects of u/s until now so we didn't know then...

Possible negative effects of u/s

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