When two red lines appear on your pregnancy test, you are officially a mother-to-be. So how does your baby transmit his/her “voice” to you? Fetal heartbeat The fetal heartbeat is the earliest sound from your baby. The earliest ultrasound can show the formation of the fetal primitive heart tube beat after about 6 weeks of pregnancy. Most mothers-to-be can clearly detect the fetal heartbeat in the abdomen with a Doppler stethoscope after 15 or 16 weeks. Measuring the fetal heart rate is a mandatory part of every maternity checkup. However, I am often asked by mothers, “Do I need to buy a Doppler stethoscope to measure my baby’s heart rate at home?” My answer is: No, it is not recommended. The first reason is that when the gestational week is small, it is difficult for the parents to find the location of the fetal heart without medical background, and it will increase the psychological burden for no reason when they cannot hear the fetal heart; the second reason is that the fetal heart only means that the fetus is alive, but it does not represent the good or bad fetal responsiveness, so it is more meaningful to feel the fetal movement more often. The first thing you need to do is to get a good idea of what you’re doing. The normal fetal heart rate is 110 to 160 beats per minute, with a neat rhythm and moderate strength, like the ticking of a clock. The fetal heart rate can be accelerated by 10 to 20 times/min when the fetus is moving. 2.If the fetal heart rate is consistently higher than 160 beats/minute or consistently lower than 110 beats/minute, it is abnormal. Fetal movement Starting from 9 weeks of pregnancy, the baby in the womb takes its first human shape and its limbs have grown out, at this time the fetus will squirm in the womb, which is the initial fetal movement. However, the fetal movement at this time is very weak and can only be seen on ultrasound. After the fourth month of pregnancy, as the little thing in the belly grows, the active movement of the fetus in the mother’s womb is the fetal movement we can feel, such as breathing, opening mouth movement, swallowing amniotic fluid, rolling movement, etc. These are as if the baby is reminding us of his (her) existence. 1, under normal circumstances, most pregnant women will feel the fetal movement in 17 weeks to 22 weeks, of course, there are individual differences. 2, the change of fetal movement is sometimes closely related to the state of the mother. 3, after 8 weeks counting fetal movement is the easiest and most intuitive means to monitor the status of the fetus, when the baby has intrauterine hypoxia or abnormal, fetal movement is often the first signal to the outside world, pay attention to these signals and make timely treatment, often can reduce the stillbirth rate of 70%. Electronic fetal monitoring By the end of each maternity check-up in late pregnancy (usually starting at 34-36 weeks, high-risk pregnant women can start at 28-30 weeks), pregnant mothers will need to do fetal heart monitoring. Fetal heart monitoring is the tracing of continuous fetal heartbeat, fetal movement and contractions over a period of time, which can reflect the good or bad intrauterine status of the fetus and is the best indication of the central nervous condition of the fetus. 1, the fetal sleep cycle: each time lasts about 20-40 minutes, you need to avoid the fetal sleep cycle when doing fetal heart monitoring. 2, pregnant mothers are not recommended to do fetal heart monitoring on an empty stomach, otherwise the starvation state of the fetus does not move affect the evaluation of fetal heart monitoring. 3, fetal electronic monitoring is also an important means to assess whether the fetus is hypoxic after delivery. The purpose of continuous fetal heart monitoring is to observe the change of fetal heartbeat and contractions under the effect of increasingly strong contractions. In case of abnormal fetal heartbeat, such as slowing down of the fetal heartbeat, it is necessary for a specialist obstetrician and gynecologist to assess the relationship between the slowing down of the fetal heartbeat and the contractions to determine if there is a risk of intrauterine hypoxia.