Pregnancy Wheel Essay

767 Words2 Pages

Outline Intro
Determining the gestational age of a fetus is very important for the well being of the fetus throughout the pregnancy. Women are encouraged to get prenatl care. With a pregnancy wheel, clinicans use the tool to determine the woman’s due date, fetus’s approximate weight, appropriate testing, and more.

What is a pregnancy wheel? According to Naegele’s rule, a typical pregnancy is 280 days long, or 40 weeks, therefore, a device was needed to help clinicians know what was happening to the pregnany woman and developing fetus week to week. The pregnancy wheel is a device that has helped the perinatal healthcare provider in a variety of ways. The wheel has exact dates that are important to the development of the fetus, and also provides …show more content…

Naegele 's rule is a way to calculate a due date for a pregnancy. Without the pregnancy wheel, the clinical is expected to estimates the expected date of delivery (EDD) by adding one year, subtracting three months, and adding seven days to the first day of a woman 's last menstrual period (LMP). The result is approximately 280 days (40 weeks) from the start of the last menstrual period. Another method is by adding 9 months and 7 days to the first day of the last menstrual period.

How accurate is it?
Teh average length of menstrual cycle for a woman is 28 days. Though, 99.5% of all women have a period within 24-38 days. This means, if a woman is not regular with her cycle, her due date may be incorrect, bt with prenatal testing (i.e. ultrasounds), and clinical measuring of the woman’s uterus, due dates can be close to accurate.

How does it work?
The device is a small plastic wheel with a calendar among the outer circular area. Inside the big circular device is a smaller circle to align the date with the last menstrual period and date of delivery for a uaul 40 week pregancy. Markers placed seven “days” apart to display and label the number of weeks between the last menstrual period and the delivery date. Ideally, this is 40 weeks. The little marks between the weeks indicate days, therefore, if the marker showed 30 weeks and two little “days” marked, the pregnancy would be 30 2/7 days …show more content…

Mobile – Since the invention of smartphones, the invention of applications to add to your phone has helped clinicians too. As a nurse, when a patient comes to my floor and state they may be in labor, I pull out my mobile device and all I have to do is add in their due date and it will calculate everything for me, from the date of their last period, to how big the fetus is, and gestational age at that time. Examples of these types of appilications are Perfect OB Wheel, Gest Age, and The OB Wheel Pro http://appcrawlr.com/ios-apps/best-apps-gestational-age Computer websites – Website are available for the patient and clinicians to see what may be developing on the fetus as well as due date as well. Example of computer sites http://www.prokerala.com/health/pregnancy/pregnancy-wheel/ http://www.babymed.com/pregnancy-wheel handheld - The typical embodiment of this device is a circular piece of paper, plastic, or metal between 4 inches and 10 inches in diameter. This was the root of gestational calculations, until technology came along. These wheels are always available on labor and delivery units and OBGYN offices for quick computing when

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