If you are pregnant and you are not a new mother or you know other women who have recently become mothers, you are surely familiar with the expression “go to monitors”. Maybe you have never heard it or yes, but you don’t know what it means. The truth is that fetal monitoring is a very common test in the last weeks of pregnancy, so you should understand its purpose.
Apart from periodic ultrasounds during pregnancy, fetal monitoring is a most useful and reliable technique, as well as non-invasive and painless, to check the well-being of the baby inside the uterus. Let’s see what it consists of, what it is for and when it is performed.
Fetal monitoring consists of a test that allows evaluating fetal well-being. With it, the baby’s heart rate is checked, recording her heartbeat. Likewise, it is monitored that they have proper oxygenation, are well fed and their movements are regular.
It also records the frequency and intensity of the contractions and how these influence the state of the fetus. Its main task is to rule out any indication of discomfort in the baby for which it is necessary to induce labor or perform a cesarean section.
External fetal monitoring is the most common and is performed by placing a device on the pregnant woman’s belly, at the level of the fetus’s heart. This small monitor records the baby’s heart rate and outputs the data to a computer that prints a graph with the results. It lasts about 20 or 30 minutes and during that time the mother must lie on her back or on her side.
On the other hand, there is also internal monitoring, which is done through an intrauterine catheter, placing an electrode on the baby’s head to measure its heart rate, as well as a uterine pressure terminal in the uterus. It is less common and is performed mainly at the time of delivery.
Fetal monitoring is usually performed when the pregnancy reaches term, that is, from week 38 of gestation. From that moment, it is usually carried out regularly, every three or four days depending on each particular case, until the time of delivery. In addition, it is also done during the birth itself, to ensure that the contractions do not interfere with the well-being of the baby.
It may also be needed before the 38th week of pregnancy or done more frequently when there are certain complications that increase the need to keep the baby under control. For example, if the mother has many Braxton Hicks contractions, if there is loss of amniotic fluid, or if there are risks of premature labor.
