42 year-old woman to give birth

A 42 year-old woman who had given birth twise at age 31 and 35, is it safe for her to give birth again at age 42-43?

 

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Me and my wife did . The Doctors were not all happy with it and the chances of Down syndrome are at a higher factor from what they say . My son is gifted and very healthy at the age of 13 now . So is my wife . She went trough the change of life right after his birth so it was like last chance and we snatched it out of the law of the odds . He is going to save the world one day . His Greatness already shines like a beacon on a mountain top . Like a lighthouse for wayward sailors . Go for it but be aware of the risk before you and your wife make the final decision

 

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The older, over 40, the woman is the more likely she will have complications with the child. That's not to say she can't have any more but just that she is taking a greater risk of having an unhealthy child.

 

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Me mum did, at 44.

...so, while safe for her, it was probably not a safe move for society.

 

Its not that uncommon.

http://www.mothers35plus.co.uk/intro.htm

 

based on the text above, age is not the contributing factor to Down Syndrome.

 

Yes there is, as the article states: The risk increases as a woman gets older

Indeed, for a woman less than 30 the risk is < 1 in 1000, but at age 40 it has increased to over 1 in 100, or > ten times more likely.

 

But it says:

. In fact, 80% of babies born with Down syndrome are born to women younger than 35

 

That's because so many more women have babies when they are less than 35 then when they are over 35, so because most babies are born to young mothers, most babies with Downs will also be born to younger mothers, but still the CHANCE of having a baby with Downs does go up as you age, such that a mother over 40 is roughly 10 times more likely to have one than when she was less than 30.

Arthur

 

There is a test were they stick a long needle into the womb pull out fluids and check for abnormal stuff, but the test comes with risk also . Then if the couple were to find Down Syndrome or birth defects will the couple abort ? Lots to consider for couples approaching the end of child barring age.
My wife and Me chose not to do the test because of the risk of doing the test , but we knew we would not abort anyway so no reason to take the risk

 

Yes, given that a baby has Down Syndrome, the mother is likely to be under 35 years old because that's when most women have their children anyway.

However, given that a woman is over 40, she is more likely to bear a DS baby, than a woman under 40. Years ago, the medical community touted "40" as the magic age at which women were more likely to bear DS children. In reality, it is a continuous spectrum of probabilities, and there is no huge jump at the magic age of 40.

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From AAFP on Down Syndrome

Looking at this graph, experts may have extended the straight-line approximation of the probabilities in the mid-40's downward, and it happens to intersect the 0% line at about 40 years old. This is a common method of simplifying such data into piece-wise approximations.

 

DS is screened for using ultrasound (nuchal fold test) in combination with a blood test (PCR). Amniocentesis is only performed as a confirmatory test if the ultrasound and blood test indicate a high chance of a DS baby.

 

Can down syndrome happen after birth?
If DS is detectable, it is ok for 40+ women to get pregnant, she can opt for abortion.

 

DS is genetic.
You are always born with it.

Yes it is detectable, but not that early in the pregnancy, which increases the risks if you then elect an Abortion.

 

Millions of women give birth in thier 40's. Happens all the time. A lot of women would keep it whether it was Downs or not. Downs is a "fragile X" condition, which means it's genetic. It's never gonna "come on" after birth. You've either got it or you ain't.

 

The nuchal fold ultrasound test and blood test that I referred to earlier is performed at 12 weeks (end of the first trimester) and is considered to give a fairly accurate indication of the DS risk. The output of the test is never a definitive answer - it is always a probability (eg. a 1 in 2000 chance of having a DS baby).

 

Down syndrome cannot be diagnosed based on ultrasound findings alone. These findings simply suggest that there is a higher risk that the fetus may have Down syndrome.

The triple test can detect approximately 60 percent of the pregnancies affected by trisomy 21 and will miss about 40% of cases.

Aminocentesis is not usually performed till after the 16th week.

http://downsyndrome.about.com/od/diagnosingdownsyndrome/a/diagnosislong_r_2.htm

 

Yes, I know. That’s why I said in post #12 that amniocentesis is performed as a confirmatory test if the ultrasound/blood test indicate a probability of DS above a certain threshold (don’t know what that is).

 

Does the amnio still carry the high miscarriage risk?