Around 700,000 women get pregnant in the UK every year. Over 95% of these pregnancies result in the birth of a healthy baby. However, in a few cases, there are problems affecting the baby's development.
This could be a serious mental or physical abnormality. If health professionals and parents know about any problems early on, they can make decisions about how best to deal with it. This may involve preparing for special care that will be needed after the birth, or choosing to terminate the pregnancy (have an abortion).
What is antenatal screening?
Antenatal screening is a way of assessing whether the unborn baby (foetus) could develop or has developed an abnormality or other condition during pregnancy. Screening is not the same as diagnosis – it tells health professionals how likely a baby is to develop certain conditions.
If the risk of complications is found to be high, the mother may be offered a pre-natal diagnosis. This is a test to find out more about how likely the baby is to be born with the suspected condition.
Examples of diagnostic tests include amniocentesis and chorionic villus sampling (CVS). They are not offered routinely because they are often quite invasive (go into the body) and are unnecessary for the majority of women who have healthy pregnancies. You can find more information about the common diagnostic tests in separate encyclopaedia topics.
Mental
Mental refers to the processes in the mind.
Abortion
An abortion or termination is a medical procedure that ends pregnancy. The method used depends on the stage of pregnancy.
Foetus
A foetus is an unborn baby, from the eighth week of pregnancy until birth.
Chorionic villus sampling
Chorionic villus sampling is a test during pregnancy to see if there are any genetic problems with the foetus. A small sample of tissue is taken from the placenta.
Invasive
Invasive refers to tests or procedures which enter the body or puncture the skin. It can also refer to a tumour that invades healthy tissues.
