Your doctor will make individualized recommendations based on your starting weight. While every pregnancy is different, most women carrying twins will have more frequent prenatal visits than women carrying only one baby. If your twins are sharing one placenta, you will automatically have a more frequent monitoring schedule. Maternal-fetal medicine specialists see high-risk pregnancies, but not every twin pregnancy will fall into this category.
To find the best care provider for your twins, make sure that the physician is comfortable managing twins, including vaginal delivery of twins rather than only offering a cesarean section C-section for delivery.
A little more than half of twin pregnancies end in preterm delivery before 37 weeks. While 40 weeks is the full gestation period of the average pregnancy, most twin pregnancies are delivered at approximately 36 weeks range weeks depending on the type of twin pregnancy. Unfortunately, preventing preterm labor with multiples is more challenging than with a singleton pregnancy because the interventions used with singleton pregnancies are not as effective with multiples.
Scientific data show that bed rest does not prevent preterm delivery. In fact, bed rest can increase your risk of developing blood clots and have negative financial and social consequences. During delivery is when things differ significantly. However, the list of things which are more likely to occur with more babies includes:. Your antenatal team will be very aware of all these risks; this is why you have extra special care.
Together, you and your antenatal team can increase the chance of a safe delivery of healthy babies. When you are expecting twins then sometimes one of the babies receives more of the blood supply, usually because the blood supplies from a shared placenta are connected. This condition is called twin-to-twin transfusion syndrome TTTS. TTTS happens in about 1 in identical twin pregnancies.
It is a serious condition, as the twin who is not getting enough blood may become anaemic and may not grow well, whilst the over-supplied twin may be overloaded with fluid. If you are pregnant with more than one baby, you will have regular scans to watch out for TTTS, particularly if it is thought that your babies share a placenta. If TTTS is picked up you will be monitored very closely and if things seem to be severe enough to affect the babies, there are several possible treatments.
The choice varies with the severity of your baby's condition and the stage of your pregnancy. Options include draining some of the amniotic fluid amnidrainage from around the twin with the excess supply which seems to even out the circulation , and in-womb laser treatment of the placenta to seal off blood vessels that are diverting too much blood to one twin. Amnidrainage may need to be repeated, whilst laser treatment is usually one treatment.
These procedures are very often successful but there is a risk to your babies and a safer option, if you are further on in your pregnancy, can be to deliver your babies early. Multiple births are hard work in pregnancy but can also be tough afterwards. Tiredness, baby blues and postnatal depression may all be more marked in mothers of multiple babies.
If you are expecting twins or more you are likely to be offered a tour of the baby units at the hospital where you plan to give birth. It is sensible to do this, as it makes a strange environment seem a little more familiar if you unexpectedly find yourself there.
Feeding and caring for multiple babies is a huge challenge and this won't stop when you leave hospital. You may at times feel completely overwhelmed. In addition to your partner, friends, family, midwife, GP and health visitor there are a number of support groups and organisations which focus on multiple birth and will offer ongoing help and support. If your babies share a placenta then you will usually find this out at your first scan, when the ultrasonographer will look closely to discover whether the babies also share one amnion.
If your babies each have their own, separate placenta, then they are most likely to be non-identical. There is a small chance they could be amongst the one third of identical twin pregnancies that have separate placentas. In this case you may not know during pregnancy. After birth it may be difficult to say, just by looking, if your babies are identical. Identical twins can look different at birth. Their heads may be different shapes because they were moulded differently by their position in the womb and during labour, and one may be larger than the other.
The DNA test for twins is called zygosity determination. You take DNA samples by sweeping a cotton bud inside each baby's mouth. Cochrane Database Syst Rev. Twin Res Hum Genet. Epub Oct Multiple pregnancy: having more than one baby ; Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, November My girlfriend took 6 at home pregnancy tests - 4 were positive. The nurse couldn't give us an exact diagnosis - only her own opinion on whether or not my girlfriend Disclaimer: This article is for information only and should not be used for the diagnosis or treatment of medical conditions.
Egton Medical Information Systems Limited has used all reasonable care in compiling the information but make no warranty as to its accuracy. Consult a doctor or other health care professional for diagnosis and treatment of medical conditions.
For details see our conditions. In this article What is multiple pregnancy? What is the difference between identical and non-identical twins? What happens when an egg is fertilised?
What types of twin pregnancy are there? What types of non-identical twins are there? Why does multiple pregnancy occur? How common is multiple pregnancy? Who can have a multiple pregnancy? Is antenatal care different in multiple pregnancy? Diagrams Figures. Diagrams and Figures. Overview of anatomy. How identical twins can be formed. Monochorionic diamnionic twin placenta. Monochorionic diamnionic twin placenta , like column B above. Very rarely, fraternal twins share a placenta.
These types of twins are called chimaeric twins. Sometimes a fertilised egg splits within a few days of conception to produce genetically identical twins. Because these twins come from one zygote, they are also known as monozygotic. Identical twins are the same sex. About one-third of identical twins split soon after fertilisation and form completely separate twins. Like fraternal twins, these twins have separate placentas.
The other two-thirds split after they attach to the wall of the womb. As a result, they share a placenta. The technical name for this is monochorionic. In a very small number of identical twins, splitting might happen even later. In this case, both twins share an inner sac , called the amnion, in addition to sharing a placenta. The technical name for this is monoamniotic twins. For example, a twin who receives less blood from a shared placenta might weigh less at birth.
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