Heart rate reveals a lot about the health of the fetus. However, can we guess the sex of the fetus through the fetal heart rate as many rumors say?
Along with taking care of the health and learning how to take care of the baby, the gender of the fetus is always a concern and a prominent topic in the conversation of pregnant mothers. Is the method of guessing the sex of the fetus by heart rate accurate or not? We all refer to the article below!
Mothers often whisper about stories surrounding pregnancy that fetal heart rate can predict gender as early as in the first trimester . If the heart rate is above 140 beats per minute (bpm) then the fetus is a girl, below 140 bpm is a boy.
However, the truth is that you cannot predict the sex of the fetus by the fetal heart rate.
The fetal heart will form around 6 weeks of pregnancy. You can even see and measure flickering lights on the ultrasound. The beats per minute start at 90–110 beats / minute and increase each day. The fetal heart rate continues to rise until it peaks around 9 weeks, from 140–170 bpm for boys and girls.
In a study just published, the researchers examined the ultrasound results from 966 women with pregnancy under 14 weeks of age. They repeat this process again during the second trimester, when the fetus is between 18 weeks old and 24 weeks old. At this time, the sex of the fetus can also be determined by ultrasound.
Up to this point, only 477 women still met the study criteria. Of those, 244 cases were girls, while 233 were boys.
The average heart rate for boys during the first 3 months was 154.9 bpm (may fluctuate above or below 22.8 bpm) and for girls, it was 151.7 bpm (above or below), the study found. below 22.7 bpm).
Another 2016 study looked at the fetal heart rate of 332 girls and 323 boys during the first trimester. The conclusion showed that the researchers did not find significant differences between them.
In other words, guessing the sex of the fetus through this approach is completely unscientific. This is because there is no significant difference between boys and girls heart rates in the early stages of pregnancy.
The sex of the fetus is formed as soon as a sperm meets the egg, and the sex of the fetus is determined before you know you are pregnant. The fetus inherits an X or Y chromosome from its father's sperm. Girls will carry the XX genetic information pattern, while boys carry XY.
You may also be surprised to learn that your baby's genitals are not growing right away. In fact, boys and girls look quite similar between weeks 4 and 6. The fetus starts to vary between weeks 10 and 20.
While the fetal heart rate may not tell you if your baby is a boy or a girl, there are other medical techniques to help you determine the sex of your baby :
Pregnancy ultrasound : This technique can be performed between 18 and 20 weeks of pregnancy. In addition to determining the sex of the fetus, it has many other benefits, such as helping diagnose ectopic or dangerous pregnancy. fetal muscle with Down syndrome.
Placenta biopsy : In addition to the sex of the fetus, this technique can detect chromosomal abnormalities in the fetus.
Blood test : this test detects the presence or absence of the Y chromosome - the male sex chromosome - in your blood to show the sex of the fetus as a boy or girl.
Science has proven that the prediction of the sex of the fetus via fetal heart rate is completely unreliable. So, instead of guessing your baby is a boy or a girl yourself, you should perform medical techniques to get the most accurate results!
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