• 02
  • February
    2012

A miscarriage can be a nightmare for an expecting couple. Grieving mothers and fathers may experience a roller coaster of emotions as they process the event, from guilt and anger to depression and numbness. One would hope, at least, that the medical care and advice a couple receives in connection with the miscarriage is based on a solid foundation. A new study, however, has found that overly-stringent guidelines may lead to the misdiagnosis of miscarriage and the death of children in healthy pregnancies.

When a pregnant woman experiences bleeding, a doctor will generally measure the embryo and the gestational sac using an ultrasound. After seven to 10 days, another measurement will be taken. If the doctor determines that there has not been any measured growth during that period, the diagnosis would generally be that a miscarriage occurred.

Medical study coauthors, Anne Pexsters and Tom Bourne, found that the margin of error in measuring a fetus through ultrasound can range as high as 20 percent. So, if the initial measurement was on the high side, and the follow-up was on the low side, the fetus might appear to not have grown. In addition, the study showed that it's not unusual for a fetus to grow only a little, or not at all, during such a period and still be absolutely healthy and viable.

"These errors could lead to a false diagnosis of miscarriage being made in some women," the authors of the study concluded.

The authors hope that their work will lead to a review of the guidelines doctors use for measuring fetuses and diagnosing miscarriages, as well as funding for larger studies to establish better guidelines. While these changes will not happen overnight, raising awareness of the potential for fatal medical malpractice under the current guidelines should at least encourage more doctors to exercise the utmost degree of caution in diagnosing a miscarriage.

Source: The Atlantic, "A false positive for miscarriage: Terminating healthy pregnancies," Alice G. Walton, Oct. 21, 2011