cyst

[patrick1983]

hi, my wife has been admitted to hospital. she had a cyst somewhere around the ovary during the 1st pregnancy. this didnt cause her much pain and we had a healthy boy through c- section. however, this time round she is 26 weeks pregnant. the same cyst wasn't noticed during her scans and it has grown to 9cm. its the 2nd time shes been in hospital in the past fortnight.
the heartbeat and baby are fine at the moment. they have given her steriods to help develop the babies lungs at a faster rate.

. does this mean they are looking to operate soon?
. if the baby is born around 28 weeks will it stay in hospital in a baby unit up until the 40th week?
. is there anything to worry about having a premature baby? i.e. illnesses, defects...
. whats the earliest they can bring the baby out?

all comments are appreciated. im hoping everything clears up and she has a c-section somewhere close to the due date at worst. thanks.

[JoyRenee]

*I want to add that they will monitor your premature baby for certain signs of readiness to go home. They won't just pick a random date and say baby will go home by 40 weeks. Baby might go home well before the 40-week mark or they may still need to stay in the NICU (Neonatal Intensive Care Unit) well past the 40-week mark. That is really just anybody's guess and dependent on how well baby is doing.

[JoyRenee]

Preterm babies can have many problems, yes. Mostly respiratory and they are still very delicate. If your baby were born now their skin may still be almost translucent and they would most likely have to stay in a warming bed and you might not get to hold them because they are so sensitive to touch. But your baby shouldn't have "defects" unless they were genetically prone to something such as Down Syndrome or something similar. They won't come out without an arm or anything.

The steroid is to help their lungs develop in order to prevent respiratory problems should baby come early.

It will really depend on how your baby is doing on when they will go home. They will most likely not require them to stay until the time they would've been 40-weeks. I know many women who've taken their preemies home around what would have been the 7th or 8th month mark if they had still been pregnant.

They consider viability to be 24 weeks. Before then they most likely wouldn't do much of anything to keep baby alive; though I don't really know much about that. Obviously the longer baby can gestate, the better.

They should be able to lacerate the cyst without harm to baby but again, each case is different and unique and obviously a doctor is more qualified to talk to you about what might happen. In fact you should be asking them these questions. Write them all down and go through the questions with your doctor. Don't feel stupid for asking; you're concerned for your wife and your baby as you should be.