I overheard, because I was you, eavesdropping (hey if you don’t want information on the Straight Dope Message Board don’t talk on your cellphone on the bus) and a lady indicated that her sister had twins and no one knew.
She said something like "No, no one saw it not the doctor nor ultrasound, it came as a surprise to everyone.
Now to me with all the tests they do on babies, shouldn’t a doctor who’s any good be able to see this.
Granted I don’t know in this case but I was just wondering in general, if basic standard medical care is given to a woman how likely is it that a doctor would not be able to tell it’s twins?
INAD, but I do have twin sons. Nowadays, they are trying to minimize the number of ultrasounds because of suspicions that it might have a greater effect on the baby than previously thought. It is possible that they saw what they expected with a cursory examination, and so didn’t go any further. Without further evidence, such as excessive amniotic fluid (which was the clue that led to us discovering our double joy) or more weight gain than is expected, it’s possible that the doctors involved didn’t go looking for more tykes.
It’s common, even standard practice I’d venture, for women to get 2 ultrasounds during pregnancy these days; the first at around 8 weeks “for dates” (at or near the first OB visit), and again around 28 weeks for growth and developemnt. It is unlikely a twin pregnancy would be missed.
At least that is my experience as someone ‘working in the field’. I do live in a very large city with lots of OB’s and lots of hospitals. I suppose this would be the generally accepted practice in most places that have lots of medical services available. Is this a rural area where there is not a lot of available services or something?
I did see a case two or so years ago where a quadruplet pregnancy was misdagnosed as a triplet pregnancy. The doc who ‘missed’ the 4th baby is not generally recognised as a ‘very good’ Doctor.
I was on a city bus in Chicago but I just overheard a conversation, one sided from a cell phone. Who knows in this case what kind of care that woman’s sister had.
It just got me to thinking in general about that, it used to be quite common in novels and comedy shows to have unexpected twins and it was a good plotline. But I was thinking how unlikely that would happen today
To me, the more credible stories are those of missed higher order multiples - a third baby when you were expecting twins, let’s say. At that point, I’d guess that the ultrasounds are already a bit of a jumble, and you might more easily not see something.
Sometimes it’s hard enough work for them to find just one heartbeat, if the baby’s in a funny position. And once you’ve found one, you don’t go looking for a second…
This happened to a friend of mine - they didn’t see the second twin until her third ultrasound. You should have seen her face when she came in to work after that OB appointment. And this was at one of the best-reputed teaching hospitals in the Midwest (Northwestern Memorial).
My wife was sent for an ultrasound at around 7 weeks and they found twins. The ob/gyn later said she suspected twins because the wife was bigger than she’d expect… meaning either twins or further along than 7 weeks. As the pregnancy progressed, she grew much bigger than she had with our older daughter, to the point that she was put on bedrest after about 4.5 months.
I don’t know if this experience was typical, but there was no way we would not have known there were two buns in the oven.