At each medical visit during your pregnancy, the gynecologist follows the growth of your child. One day, he says, "Hum, he's doing well this baby" ...
If the 4-week-old embryo is no bigger than a comma, it will quickly gain weight. At 7 months, he weighs 1.7 kg (for 41 cm) and eventually about 3 or 4 kg (for 50 cm). These figures are obviously only averages and your child may, for hereditary or medical reasons, be more rebounded than others.
How is the weight of the fetus evaluated?
- Clinical examination : the main way for the doctor or midwife to estimate the weight of the fetus is to measure, from the 4th month of pregnancy, the uterine height, distance between the upper edge of your pubis and the upper part of the uterus , with a tape measure. For example, it will average 24 cm to 6 months.
- ultrasound If there is any doubt about the normality of the baby's weight in relation to gestational time, an ultrasound is used to measure the diameter of his head, the abdominal circumference (waist circumference) and the length of his femur. These data are plotted on reference curves expressed as "percentiles". Normality is between the 10th and the 90th percentiles. It's not because these numbers are high in the 4th month of pregnancy that your baby will be fat at the end.
Why does it seem too big?
- Family origin If you or the dad weighed more than 4 kg at birth, it's a safe bet that this is also the case for your toddler.
- A "big" baby can be a sign of gestational diabetes, diabetes that appears during pregnancy and disappears right after birth.
- louser detect it, it is recommended to carry out a screening by a blood sugar load test during the 6th month. In some maternities, it is practiced systematically.
- In case of positive diagnosisyou will be taken in hand by an obstetrician and a diabetologist. If the test is negative and your baby still looks fat a month later, a second search can be done.
A big baby, what precautions will we take?
- None if your baby exceeds the average without pathological cause.
- If you have developed gestational diabetesa diabetic-type diet (control of sugar intake) will be prescribed until the end of your pregnancy.
- If the proposed diet fails to balance your diabetes (this is the case for 5% of patients), insulin treatment will be considered. Close monitoring during the last two months is also planned for women with this disorder.