What is the price of the service?

The 3D/4D packages range from $119 to $179 depending on your needs.  Gender determination is now only $75.  (Please account for 5% sales tax on all VISA, Master Card and Discover sales.  Cash sales are exempt from sales tax.  Sorry no personal checks or Americal Express cards).

First, ignore the hefty price of their cheapest gender check package – this 3D ultrasound company is from another state and so they do not have a First Peek Ultrasound to compete with.  (In keeping with our mission to make 3D ultrasounds accessible to as many families as possible, we shook up the rest of the 3D ultrasound centers in the Chicago area by being the first to set our prices to start at $39, forcing the rest of the centers to lower their prices dramatically to keep up).

1) Sales tax is being charged on a service! When have you ever paid sales tax on other services, such as a haircut, massage, or car wash?  This company (which shall remain nameless) is charging sales tax on a service.  They may be uninformed and paying this sales tax to the state government, but if they are pocketing the money (to pay for credit card transaction fees), then this is illegal.

2) Cash sales are exempt from sales tax! Taxes are never discriminately applied depending on whether the purchase is made with cash or credit card. If this company was actually selling something that required sales tax, then not charging sales tax on cash services would be considered to be tax fraud.  However, in this case, sales tax is not required on any of these services, which makes me think again, where is this sales tax money going to?

3) Using an illegitimate sales tax  in advertising to get more money is a form of advertising fraud as well. Unless they are dutifully handing over this sales tax on some of their service sales to the state government, that is. In that case, they are just hurting themselves and making prices higher for their customers unnecessarily.

When we first started First Peek Ultrasound in 2008, we noticed other 3D ultrasound centers, including one in the Chicagoland area, charging sales tax on 3D ultrasounds for years, which went against my own understanding of tax law.  I confirmed the illegitimacy of this charge with the Illinois Department of Revenue and never charged sales tax on our services.  It was only after blogging about this situation in this post that this shady practice was stopped by the other ultrasound clinic in our area.

The ultrasound studio in the above quote charges the local Virginia sales tax of 5%, but there are two other studios in North Carolina that add on a whopping 8.5% to all 3D ultrasound packages.  (I double-checked the state laws and they do not have a special tax on 3D ultrasounds. North Carolina does charge a sales tax on specific services, including dry cleaning and cable tv and some specific entertainment services. Do these specifically enumerated entertainment services include 3D ultrasound services and are these local centers specifically asked to charge sales tax by the state of North Carolina? It’s possible, but I doubt it, especially since there are other 3D ultrasound centers in North Carolina that do not charge the sales tax.)

It is entirely possible that many states will eventually require  sales tax on services, and this requirement will probably start with entertainment or recreational services.  For example, the State of Washington already imposes a sales tax in general for “recreational services” and the one 3D ultrasound facility in the state of Washington does in fact charge this sales tax.

What is the purpose of this article? I hope that a few customers of these 3D ultrasound centers will stumble upon my blog and will let these 3D ultrasound centers know that it is not okay to add on a surcharge and call it a sales tax in order to boost the profit margin.  While most customers may not notice and happily pay the extra amount, the practice is in fact illegal and advertising fraud and may be considered tax fraud as well.   The fact that some 3D ultrasound centers within the same state charge a sales tax while others do not and the fact that 3D ultrasound centers, on at least one occasion, have discontinued the sales tax when they are called out on it, at the very least belies the fact that the sales tax is not required and is either ignorantly being charged to consumers at best or fraudulently kept by the 3D ultrasound centers at worst.

Do you have any comments? I especially want to hear from owners of other 3D ultrasound centers who were confused by this sales tax issue.  If you do not charge sales tax while another 3D ultrasound center in your area does, has this helped or hurt your business in any way?  If you do charge sales tax, is this required by the state?   If not, is there another reason why you charge sales tax (i.e. the requirement by the city of Oak Park for all businesses who want a storefront location to charge sales tax).  We would love to hear from you.

So what falls under a non-medical purpose?

1. Seeing your baby

2. Determining if your baby is a boy or a girl

Yet a few hospitals in the Chicago area have 3D ultrasound machines in their ob/gyn clinics, and after the patient is done with her appointment, the doctor will quickly switch over to 3D mode and show the baby to the mother.  (This quick add-on period is added onto the medical ultrasound session which normally lasts 30 minutes.  In other words, the ultrasound session now exceeds the 30-minute threshold touted by the ob/gyn community.)

Also, it must be pointed out that ob/gyn doctors routinely check the gender of the baby at the 20-week ultrasound.  If the gender can not be determined at this time, the insurance company usually does not pay for an additional ultrasound.  The pregnant woman can sometimes plead for the ob/gyn to check the gender at another visit, ”off the record,” as my wife did when she was pregnant, or she can wait another 20 weeks not knowing whether her baby is a boy or a girl.

Ob/gyn physicians who happen to have the privilege of having a 3D ultrasound machine in their hospital often go against the rules and perform 3D ultrasounds off the books, as they have done in the past by checking the gender on extra ultrasound visits.

If 3D ultrasounds used for non-medical purposes were truly harmful and if there was truly a consensus among ob/gyn physicians that these elective ultrasounds are harmful, there would not be this growing trend of ob/gyn clinics and hospitals, including Northwestern Memorial Hospital in Chicago, to offer free 3D ultrasounds during routine screening visits of  their pregnant patients.  In fact, many of these ob/gyn clinics are starting to offer these 3D ultrasounds as a “free” service in order to attract more patients, sometimes also offering CD’s and DVD’s of the session.  By offering it for free, it appears that they are providing a service with no economic benefit out of the goodness of their heart, yet the economic benefit for these clinics from the increased number of patients is very real.

In other words, the argument currently held by most ob/gyn physicians is that elective non-medical 3D ultrasounds are harmful to pregnant women and their babies and is an affront to the medical profession and an embarrassment to the profession of ultrasound technicians, unless it is provided off the record by ob/gyn physicians in ob/gyn clinics or hospitals for their own economic benefit.  It’s fine if we do it, but no one else should do it.

This hypocrisy can only be explained by my overall premise that the current bias against 3D ultrasounds among ob/gyn physicians has nothing to do with the concern for pregnant women or their babies but has to do with money, which is a rerun of the routine elective circumcisions performed by ob/gyn’s without informed consent in the 1970’s while rabbis were prohibited from performing circumcisions without a medical license (remember that?).

(Of course, there are many other ob/gyn physicians and ultrasound technicians who are genuinely concerned for the welfare of their patients and have only had the misfortune of having been taught this bias in school and in residency training and so they have carried this bias as well.  But the source of the bias is still originally based on economics.)

Please note that this is a risky subject to deal with head on, as there is a genuine risk of sounding angry and at odds with the medical community.  As a pediatrician myself, I definitely do not want to alienate other physicians or sound like I know better than ob/gyn physicians when it comes to dealing with pregnant patients.  I simply want to point out this one isolated instance of a medical bias based on non-medical reasons.  Please note that at First Peek Ultrasound, we have a very good working relationship with the physicians and midwives of our customers, and more and more physicians are actually actively referring their customers to us.   In this series, I am only speaking about some ob/gyn physicians.

When we first started First Peek Ultrasound, the majority of ob/gyn physicians were deeply against 3D ultrasounds.  Also, it was very difficult to find good ultrasound technicians due to the fact that these technicians are taught in school that 3D ultrasounds are definitely harmful to babies (which is untrue) and other related falsehoods.  Now, we are seeing that the percentage of ob/gyn physicians  in the Chicago area who are against 3D ultrasounds have dropped (roughly to about 50%), and this is in part due to many of their patients coming to see us and other 3D ultrasound centers and reporting their experiences back to their physicians.

For our physicians who want to learn more about what we do, please visit our dedicated 3D ultrasound page for Chicago-area physicians and midwives.

Do you have any comments? We especially want to hear from ob/gyn physicians, the ones who agree and disagree with what I have posted here.

As a first-time father, I was amazed to see my baby while my wife was still pregnant.  The 3D ultrasound really helped me become more involved with the pregnancy and with the whole bonding process.  I was stationed in Iraq during the entire time my wife was pregnant, so I missed a lot of the milestones of the pregnancy:

1. The first ultrasound
2. The first episode of vomiting
3. The first pregnancy argument about nothing
4. Choosing  a name for your child
5. The baby shower
6. The first stretch mark
7. Finding out if it’s a boy or a girl

So it really helped my morale when I saw my baby’s pictures and DVD of my baby’s movements before he was born, and it gave me something else to look forward to when I came home.

We started First Peek Ultrasound for all our expectant fathers out there as well as for the expectant mothers.

For all you pregnant women who are wondering what to get him for Father’s Day, or even whether to celebrate Father’s Day if you’re still pregnant, I urge you to get him a 3D ultrasound. It will be as much a Father’s Day gift for him as it will be for you.

Hint: If you get the Premium Plus Package, the prenatal massage comes with the package.  So you can tell him the 3D ultrasound is a Father’s Day gift for him, but you can enjoy the prenatal massage as well.  Hey, you can’t help it–it’s included!

For all you Dads out there, how was your experience seeing the 3D ultrasound of your baby. I would love to see your comments below on how you especially benefited from the 3D ultrasound experience as an expectant father.

By the looks of the websites of many 3D ultrasound centers, this seems to be true.  But maybe we’re biased.

What do you think?  Should pregnant women celebrate Mother’s Day?  Should they receive gifts for Mother’s Day, or should they wait until they actually have a baby?

• Fetus
• Friends
• Family
• Toys and books for other kids
• CD of music you want playing in the background of your DVD (optional)
• Cell phone (to call friends and family immediately when finding out if it’s a boy or girl)
• Kleenex (in case you or Dad get emotional)

At First Peek Ultrasound, we are proud to now offer prenatal massage in our very own pregnancy spa located inside our ultrasound studio, by our certified prenatal massage therapist.

Here is a list of twenty-one benefits of prenatal massage.  If you can think of any others, please write to us in your comments below.

1. Helps ease back pain
2. Helps with headaches
3. Decreases pelvic pain
4. Reduces sciatic pain
5. Increases circulation
6. Improves digestion
7. Reduces fatigue
8. Helps reduce stretch marks
9. Helps reduce swelling and edema in the legs
10. Reduces stress
11. Improves sleep
12. Prevents post-partum depression
13. Relaxes and soothes the baby
14. May prevent ADHD, PTSD, and anxiety in your baby
15. More likely to touch and smile at your baby
16. Reduces nausea
17. Helps with labor pain
18. Lower rates of prematurity
19. Can help you quit smoking
20. Can help improve your sex life
21. Helps get the baby to move during your 3D ultrasound

1.  Prenatal massage helps with back pain

Back pain is the number one reason pregnant women get a prenatal massage.  In many surveys conducted, it has been shown that over half of all pregnant women have back pain at some point during their pregnancy.  10% reported to have severe back pain. And the back pain can start even long before you feel like you’re gaining any weight.  This is because the back pain has more to do with the slight shift in your center of balance than with the actual extra weight placed on your back.  That extra little mass, about the size of a pomegranate, can shift the balance enough for you to feel it.

If you’re not scared of physics, please read this. Otherwise skip the next two paragraphs.

Let’s take a closer look.  If a 1 kg force is applied downwards (what you would expect to gain when you’re 4 weeks pregnant), pushing down on your back, about 10 cm in front of your center of gravity (which is where the center of your belly may be), then that would apply a torque of 10 kg-cm, and you would have to apply an equal force of 10 kg downwards, using the muscles around your lower spine, which is located just 1 cm behind your center of gravity, in order to balance out the torque (10 kg x 1 cm = 1 kg x 10 cm), in order to keep you from spinning forward or falling over.  So that little embryo actually puts a total pressure of 11 kg (or 24 pounds) on your lower back, while you are putting constant tension on muscles that are very rarely used.  No wonder you have back pain!  This is also why some women may have back pain before they even know they are pregnant!

But what happens if you just shift your center of balance forward 8 cm.  Now, your little fetus is pushing down 1 kg at a point 2 cm in front of you (or 2 kg-cm), and your lower back muscles are now 9 cm behind your center of gravity instead of 1 cm behind, and so you will have to push down with a force of 2/9 kg (2/9 kg x 9 cm = 2 kg-cm = 2kg-cm), or 0.2kg, about half a pound.  So you would feel a total weight of 1.2 kg on your back and the weight will be better balanced.  Thus, your back pain is alleviate without pain medication and without any weight loss needed.

Prenatal massage helps alleviate back pain by 1) helping shift your center of balance so that you can utilize the physics of torque to your advantage.  Back pain is also caused by 2) the slight external rotation of your knees, which can also be corrected by alleviating fluid buildup through prenatal massage.  As if that is not enough, during pregnancy, you produce hormones that relax some of the ligaments in your body.  One of these hormones, relaxin, is critical in helping your baby come out through the narrow birth canal by relaxing your pelvic ligament.  But before then, the softening of the ligaments can 3) disrupt your posture and the way you walk, which can promote back pain.  Prenatal massage can help reset your posture, thus alleviating your back pain through this third mechanism.  There are many other additional ways that prenatal massage helps back pain as well, including alleviating stress, anxiety, allowing for the relaxation of lower back muscles, improving circulation in your lower back, and even alleviating the inflammation around the nerves of your lower back.

In a randomized study conducted by the University of Miami, pregnant women who were between 7 and 9 months pregnant were given two free prenatal massages every week. These expectant mothers ended up having less back pain as well as a number of other positive outcomes.

Here are some other ways of alleviating back pain during pregnancy.

2. Prenatal massage helps with headaches

Let’s face it. Pregnancy can give you headaches. But there are a lot of causes of headaches, and some may have nothing to do with the actual pregnancy.

• Different hormones of pregnancy may cause headaches
• Increase in blood volume that occurs during pregnancy, may cause headaches
• Pregnancy can slightly alter the shape of the lens of your eye, causing you to have a slight nearsightedness that is virtually undetectable except that you get headaches!
• Stress–a major cause of headaches.  What could be causing you so much stress?
• Lack of sleep
• Low blood sugar
• Dehydration–you’re not only drinking water for two but you also have to keep your amniotic tank full.
• Caffeine withdrawal–that no coffee rule really starts to hurt right around now
• Nicotine withdrawal
• A very mild insidious chronic respiratory failure, caused by a very slight but progressive deficiency of oxygen caused by not getting enough oxygen to your brain, which is caused by decreased blood flow to your brain, due to the weight of your baby resting on your superior vena cava while you are sleeping lying down on your back.  If you wake up with a headache every morning, and it gets better through the rest of the day, this could very well be the cause, and this can be helped by lying down on your left side while you sleep.

Prenatal massage can help with headaches by alleviating stress and tension, helping you relax, and improving your ability to sleep (your sleep architecture).

3. Prenatal massage helps decrease pelvic pain

Pelvic pain should be distinguished from lower back pain.  Pelvic pain is caused by 1) the actual uterus pushing down on the pelvis, and 2) the effects of hormones on the pelvis and pelvis ligaments.  The hormones relaxin, estrogen, and progesterone, cause softening and widening of the pelvic ligament and pubis symphysis, which can throw off your gait and center of balance and can cause pelvic pain, and then, as a result, the muscles surrounding your pelvis can compensate and then get fatigued or strained, thus causing even more pelvic pain.

Although you may not be able to prevent the normal havoc of the hormones of pregnancy on your pelvis, you can prevent the fallout from the aftereffects from the surrounding muscle.  This is best done by wearing a pelvic belt, much like how you see weightlifters wear in the gym (or on TV, if you don’t go to the gym).  Another thing that helps with pelvic pain caused by this secondary muscle strain is prenatal massage.

Other tips to help with pelvic pain during pregnancy:  Keep your knees together while rolling over in bed by wearing a very large rubber band around your knees (the kind you can get for physical therapy), and taking smaller steps when walking.

On a side note, another cause of pelvic pain in pregnancy can be endometriosis, which may get worse during pregnancy (though it is supposed to usually improve with pregnancy), and some cases may get diagnosed during pregnancy.

4. Prenatal massage can help with sciatic pain

Sciatic pain is a nerve pain caused from swelling, pinching, or some other effect on the sciatic nerve.  This pain can be electrical in nature, but can also be sharp, dull, or throbbing.  The pain is usually intermittent and is worse with walking, but can also be constant, and it may be a combination. For example, someone may have a constant dull pelvic pain, with intermittent sharp pains when standing up from a seated position, with occasional shooting electrical pain originating from the lower back and going down the back of the leg down to the knees or even to the ankles.  Sciatic pain can be caused by prolonged overuse or can be caused by sudden trauma.  In the cases that we are talking about here, sciatic pain can be caused by the weight on the lower back and pelvis from pregnancy and weight gain.

If your weight gain is more than the recommended amount during your pregnancy, then controlling your weight may be the best way to control sciatica.  However, prenatal massage can also help with sciatic nerve pain.

Sciatic nerve pain is experienced by many women in pregnancy as the uterus pushes down on the muscles of the lower back. The pressure of the uterus adds tension to the muscles of the upper and lower leg as well as the lower back, causing the muscles to swell and put pressure on nearby nerves.  These nerves can then get inflammed. Massage therapy helps heal the inflammed nerves by helping to release the tension of the associated muscles and their pressure on the nerves. Many women have experienced significant reduction in sciatic nerve pain during pregnancy through regular prenatal massage.

5. Prenatal massage can help increase circulation

6.  Prenatal massage improves digestion

It’s unknown whether massage helps digestion by increasing circulation, by relaxing the muscles associated with the digestive tract, or by alleviating stress and anxiety.

7.  Prenatal massage reduces fatigue

In addition to being able to get some much needed rest and relaxation, prenatal massage has been shown to improve sleep architecture (the ratio and timing of the different stages of sleep).

8.  Prenatal massage helps reduce stretch marks

There are very, very few things that have been proven to prevent or reduce stretch marks. Yet the stretch mark industry is a multi-million dollar industry.  Cocoa butter and many other creams have been recommended, but they serve more to cover up stretch marks, since lotions and creams generally don’t get to the deep layer of skin, where stretch marks occur.  However, massage has been shown to reduce scarring in general and prenatal massage has been shown to help prevent stretch marks by improving circulation to the skin.  Regular prenatal massage, such as on a weekly basis, before stretch marks occur, in combination with careful weight control during pregnancy, can help prevent or reduce stretch marks during pregnancy.

Another great way to prevent stretch marks is to closely monitor your weight gain to make sure that you do not gain too much weight and that you do not gain weight too quickly.  However, stretch marks are also genetic, and sometimes, there may be nothing you can do to prevent them.

Here are some additional ways to prevent or reduce stretch marks during pregnancy.

9.  Helps reduce swelling and edema in the legs

Prenatal massage helps reduce swelling in the legs and ankles, called edema, during pregnancy.  This swelling can be caused by poor circulation in the legs, increased blood volume, decreased protein in the blood, and obstruction of the veins that come from the legs due to pressure from the uterus causing a backup of blood flow into the legs and feet.  The edema can also be a symptom of pre-eclampsia.  Whatever the cause, many pregnant women notice at least a little swelling in the feet and ankles. If your shoes are getting too tight, you may want to help alleviate some of the strain by resting and relaxing more and spending more time with your legs elevated.

A prenatal massage by a certified prenatal massage therapist can help reduce ankle and foot swelling.  Prenatal massage helps in more than one way.  First, just the time spent in a relaxed position with your feet elevated, doing nothing else, can help wonders.  Second, prenatal massage can help improve circulation to and from the legs.  Third, prenatal massage can even help lymphatic flow, another factor in leg swelling.  Last but not least, by increasing blood flow and circulation throughout your body and by reducing anxiety, prenatal massage can help make it easier for your heart to pump blood throughout your body and reduce the stagnation of blood in the legs, another cause of swelling.

10. Prenatal massage reduces stress

A prenatal massage not only reduces stress and anxiety by forcing you to relax and calm yourself through the sights, sounds, textures, and smells of the massage experience, but the actual physical act of massage has been shown to increase serotonin levels (the neurotransmitter of energy, happiness, and contentment) and decrease epinephrine, norepinephrine, and cortisol levels, the hormones of stress.

Also, the prenatal massage therapist can instruct you on ways of continuing techniques to help reduce stress throughout your pregnancy. By improving the efficiency of your sleep, reducing your aches and pains, and by overall providing a comforting and nurturing environment to fall back on during times of high stress, you will find that your overall anxiety throughout your pregnancy, even when you are not getting a massage, will be much better.

Best of all, women who have less anxiety during pregnancy generally will have less anxiety during labor and childbirth, which helps dramatically with a whole slew of medical outcomes.

11.  Prenatal massage can help improve your sleep

As stated before, prenatal massage helps you sleep and helps you improve your sleep architecture–the proportion of your sleep that is set for deep sleep, light sleep, and REM sleep.  Pregnancy-related insomnia is a common complaint that can become debilitating, and sleeplessness can aggravate stress, anxiety, and even make minor aches and pains more bothersome.

A common cause of sleeplessness is not being able to “get in a good position.”  This is because when a pregnant woman lies flat on her back, the uterus may be pressing down on her veins (the superior vena cava) and block blood flow to the brain.  This can be sensed as discomfort.  But if you spent your entire life sleeping on your back, then no other position will seem right to you either.  Prenatal massage can help retune and reset your comfort zones and can help you feel comfortable falling asleep on your side

Another cause of sleeplessness in pregnancy is poor oxygenation and circulation. Prenatal massage helps with circulation and oxygenation.

Another cause of sleeplessness in pregnancy is anxiety.  When you are under a constant tension, your body will not let you fall asleep.  Prenatal massage helps you relax and fall asleep in a soothing and stress-free environment.  Your body can then re-learn this ability to relax and fall asleep.  Sometimes, one prenatal massage can help you know what the stress-free mode feels like so you can get back into that mode on your own when you need to at other times.

12.  Prenatal massage helps prevent postpartum depression

It’s true.  The following study shows that prenatal massage can help with depression during pregnancy and postpartum depression.

Pregnancy massage reduces prematurity, low birthweight and postpartum depression

Authors: Tiffany Field, Miguel Diego, Maria Hernandez-Reif, Osvelia Deeds, Barbara Figueiredo

Journal: Infant behavior & development

Pregnant women diagnosed with major depression were given 12 weeks of twice per week massage therapy by their significant other or only standard treatment as a control group. The massage therapy group women versus the control group women not only had reduced depression by the end of the therapy period, but they also had reduced depression and cortisol levels during the postpartum period. Their newborns were also less likely to be born prematurely and low birthweight, and they had lower cortisol levels and performed better on the Brazelton Neonatal Behavioral Assessment habituation, orientation and motor scales.

Infant behavior & development. 01/08/2009

13. Prenatal massage relaxes and soothes the baby

Prenatal massage not only can help relax you while you are pregnant, but it can help relax and soothe your baby as well. If your baby is “going crazy,” swimming around and kicking constantly, it can sometimes be due to certain stresses and anxiety that you are feeling yourself.  It has happened many times where a prenatal massage will help soothe the baby.

14. Prenatal massage may be able to prevent ADHD, PTSD, and anxiety in your baby

A wonderful article on the benefits of prenatal massage speaks to the amazing effect of massage on the baby.  The following excerpt was taken from Kate Jordan Seminars, and originally appeared in the August 2007 issue of Massage Magazine.

When women experience stress in pregnancy, blood levels of the neurotransmitters cortisol, adrenaline and norepinephrine surge. Conversely, levels of dopamine and serotonin are suppressed by stress; low levels of these hormones are associated with mood states like anger and anxiety. Not only would Marcy’s continued anxiety fuel more anxiety, it would lead to increased levels of these stress hormones in her body. Recent studies have shown extensive effects on the growing fetus of stress experienced by pregnant mothers. Not only do infants of stressed moms show higher levels of cortisol and lower levels of serotonin and dopamine, they seem to cry and fuss more as babies, and perform less well on such measures of infant development as the Brazelton scale.

Doctors in New York City studied expectant mothers who were in the area of the World Trade Center when it was struck on September 11, 2001. They found that their infants had smaller head circumferences and were more likely to suffer post-traumatic stress disorder.

In the study mentioned above, women who were pregnant in the third trimester who lived in the area of the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001, and who had PTSD, had babies who had smaller head circumferences and had lower salivary cortisol levels.  Having a lower cortisol level is a known risk factor in the development of PTSD later in life.  (Transgenerational Effects of Posttraumatic Stress Disorder in Babies of Mothers Exposed to the World Trade Center Attacks during Pregnancy – Rachel Yahuda, et al.)

15.  Women who receive prenatal massage are more likely to touch and smile at their baby

Who knew that prenatal massage can help with bonding of your baby?  The following study, quoted from Kate Jordan Seminars, originally appeared in the August 2007 issue of Massage Magazine.

Keep in mind that the following study compared two groups, where one group of pregnant women were randomly made to receive prenatal massage. The women did not have a choice as to which group they would be in.  Thus, this can not be explained by reverse causality (as in, maybe the mothers who touch their babies more would have chosen to have more prenatal massage in the first place).

Reva Rubin, a nursing professor at the University of Pittsburgh’s nursing school was able to show that mothers who received what she called “appropriate, meaningful touch” – back stroking delivered by office nurses during prenatal visits – were later able to touch their own babies in a “meaningful, effective and caring” way. Other research has shown that the more touch mothers receive in pregnancy, the more likely they are to stroke, smile, and talk to their infants, and thus to bond with them.

16. Prenatal massage helps with nausea

This may be due to the fact that anxiety has often been implicated as a cause of nausea and vomiting during pregnancy, and prenatal massage can help with anxiety.  Also, nausea can be caused by impaired digestion, and prenatal massage can help with digestion.

17.  Prenatal massage helps with labor pain

Prenatal massage, or perinatal massage, can help with the pain of labor.  This is due the mechanism of distractive pain therapy.  By stimulating the nerves on a different part of the body, the body is distracted and does not process the pain impulses from the other part of the body.

18. Prenatal massage can lower rates of prematurity

The study already quoted above shows that prenatal massage can help reduce prematurity and low birthweight in babies.  This is an amazing discovery.  The mechanism is not known exactly. However, it may be due to improved placental circulation, improved blood flow to the baby through the placenta, thus providing more oxygen and nutrients to the baby.

19.  Prenatal massage can help you quit smoking!

With First Peek Ultrasound’s proprietary method of prenatal smoking cessation, prenatal massage can be used to help you quit smoking.

During pregnancy, dopamine levels increase–this is one of the reasons why cigarettes can sometimes taste bad to pregnant women who normally smoke.  Pregnancy is the ideal time to quit smoking because not only do you now have plenty of health reasons to quit for you and your baby, you have the biological processes of pregnancy working in your favor!

Prenatal massage has been shown to increase dopamine levels as well as serotonin levels.  Dopamine is the neurotransmitter responsible for addiction (and many other things), and increases with smoking.  Serotonin is the neurotransmitter associated with pleasure, which can be artificially increased with many drugs, including nicotine.

During your prenatal massage, dopamine and serotonin increases in an environment not associated with smoking, thus allowing you to fulfill the craving of cigarettes in an alternative way.  This association of the relief of the craving of smoking with something else besides cigarettes can retrain the body and mind to stop its dependence on smoking.

With our prenatal smoking cessation program, you would come in for your first prenatal massage appointment during a time when you know you will have a craving to smoke.  Basically, you would not smoke during that day and you would come in that morning or afternoon to our 3D ultrasound studio.  You may feel irritable, anxious, nervous, but instead of reaching for a cigarette, you alleviate the nervousness and anxiety with a prenatal massage.  The first time will be the most difficult.  Then, you repeat this step a few more times, either with scheduled appointments, or coming in as a walk-in on Saturdays right at the time that you feel the craving for cigarettes.  The prenatal smoking cessation program comes with four prenatal massage appointments.

Another weapon in our arsenal of the prenatal smoking cessation program is the 3D ultrasound service we offer.  When you see your baby for the first time in 3D, pregnancy will be more real for you.  Some mothers have expressed to us that seeing their baby in 3D ultrasound has helped motivate them to quit smoking.  So the prenatal smoking cessation program also comes wth a Premium 3D/4D ultrasound package.

You will also get a smoking cessation discussion session led by a First Peeker specifically trained in smoking cessation.  This member of our team has a degree in psychology, experience in counseling and stress management, and specifically trained in smoking cessation.  More importantly, she does not talk down to you or lecture you.  Instead, there is a one-on-one discussion on practical ways of changing smoking behavior.  If you require more than one discussion session to complete the conversation and strategies, then this will be included in the total package.

The final weapon that we use is purely behavioral–using reward and punishment.  Our prenatal smoking cessation package will be charged up front at a price of $350.  But if you actually quit smoking, you will get a $50 check back at the end of your pregnancy (two months after your baby is born).  You can use this money to buy diapers, take your friends out to eat to celebrate, or even get a massage with us.  But by this time, you will not want to use the money to buy cigarettes.

In summary, the First Peek prenatal smoking cessation program comes with four prenatal massage therapy sessions, timed specifically to your needs, one Premium 3D/4D ultras0und package, one smoking cessation discussion session (more if needed).  The cost of this total program is $350.  You also will get a $50 check back at the end of your pregnancy, approximately 2 months after your baby is born, if and only if you have successfully quit smoking and have not returned to smoking by that time, so that the total amount you have invested to change your life will be just $300 in total.

You can purchase this package online by visiting our website, www.OakParkUltrasound.com, and scheduling your first prenatal massage online and typing in “prenatal smoking cessation program” in the Special Instructions box.  Or you can call us to set up this package for you, at 708-870-0808.  Due to the investment of setting up the program, the entire payment is due when you first sign up for the program.

Note: We can not prescribe medications as we are not a medical facility.

20. Prenatal massage can help improve your sex life!

The following is taken, somewhat out of context, directly from the blog, Sheknows.com, and the full article can be found here.

The best sex of your life: 4 Tips to improve your sex life

Elizabeth Cullen

Not only do massages feel good, but, as an added bonus, they warm up your skin and connect you with your partner.

Finally, last but not least…

21.  Prenatal massage can help get the baby to move during your 3D ultrasound

At First Peek Ultrasound, when you get the prenatal massage with your 3D ultrasound, if your baby is not in the best position, you can try your 3D ultrasound again after your prenatal massage.  Many pregnant moms say that the prenatal massage relaxes their baby and gets them to shift position, almost like they are getting comfortable.  Sometimes, this is just enough to be able to capture the perfect memento of your baby on 3D ultrasound.

So there you have it.  21 benefits of prenatal massage, courtesy of First Peek Ultrasound.

Is there a benefit of prenatal massage that you have experienced yourself which was not mentioned here?  We would love to hear about it.

Add to this list and get $10 off your next prenatal massage at First Peek Ultrasound.

In the last article, I mentioned some excellent gifts for pregnant women, including a gift certificate for a 3D ultrasound and a pregnancy massage.  Here, in this article, are the worst gifts you can give to someone who is pregnant and why these gifts are so horrible.

• Breast pump

Unless you know her very well and you know for a fact that she is planning on breastfeeding and pumping, this gift can be in poor taste.  Also, if she is not planning on breastfeeding, this gift can be considered overbearing or offensive if she feels like you are pressuring her to breastfeed.

What can be given instead:  A luxury baby bottle set, which can be used for storing pumped breastmilk or used for bottlefeeding, and is one step removed from the actual secretion of bodily fluids.

• Gomco circumcision clamp

In addition to requiring a physician license to purchase and use this equipment, a circumcision clamp will not be an appropriate gift for a pregnant woman unless you know that 1) she is having a boy and 2) she plans on having her baby boy circumcised and 3) you know that she is planning on performing the circumcision herself.  Unless she is a pediatrician or ob/gyn physician (or in some cases, a family practice physician), she is probably not qualified to perform her own baby’s circumcision.  Plus, if she is not religiously or culturally inclined towards circumcision, she may object to such a gift and may believe that you are subtly encouraging her towards having her baby boy get a circumcision.

What can be given instead:  A diaper cake makes a great gift regardless of whether your pregnant loved one is having a boy or a girl.  And if she is having a boy, whether her baby boy will be circumcised or not, he will still have to pee.  And for that, he will need diapers.  A diaper cake makes an excellent gift for a baby shower or for the holidays for your pregnant wife or girlfriend, and no blood will have to be lost with this gift.

• Explicit pregnancy sex book

This is probably not the best gift to get her if you don’t know the pregnant woman really well.  For example, if she is your employee, a friend of a friend, your postal carrier, your dentist, or your next-door neighbor.  This can be considered in poor taste, at best, and sexual harrassment, at worst.  Such books have titles such as, How to Have Orgasms During Pregnancy, and Your Orgasmic Pregnancy: Little Sex Secrets Every Hot Mama Should Know.

Unless you are giving this gift to a girlfriend, wife, partner, or significant other, you may be better off sticking with a safer alternative.

What can be given instead: What to Expect When You’re Expecting, now in its third edition, is still the best selling book among pregnant women.  Other great books for pregnant women are books of baby names and books showing the pregnancy week by week.

• Gift certificate for a sushi restaurant

If you know nothing about pregnancy, before you give a gift to a pregnant woman, you should find out which things are not generally allowed to be consumed during pregnancy.  The big ones are cigarettes, alcohol, coffee, and sushi.  Also, exotic fish and tuna in large quantities can also be harmful.  Belly creams and other cosmetics should be looked at to make sure they don’t contain vitamin A.  Giving a gift that could harm her fetus would be a major faux pas.

What can be given instead:  Instead of sushi, a gift certificate for ice cream will always be appreciated.  Instead of alcohol and coffee, there are non-alcoholic beverages that are specially designed for pregnant women, such as Preggatinis.  Here is a unique list of non-alcoholic beverages written by pregnant women themselves.

However, a gift certificate or gift card for sushi at Kamehachi or coffee at Starbucks can actually work very well for some pregnant women who can’t wait to splurge on sushi or coffee as soon as their baby is born.

What is the worst gift you received during your pregnancy?  Anything that was in very bad taste or even offensive? We would love to hear from you.

Of course, as the owner of First Peek Ultrasound, the leading 3D ultrasound center in the Chicago area, I am biased by the overwhelming satisfaction I see everyday when pregnant women see and bond with their baby.  So I would say that a gift certificate for a 3D/4D ultrasound at your local 3D ultrasound studio would be the ideal gift for your pregnant wife or girlfriend this year for Christmas, Hannukah, Kwanzaa, or winter solstice.

Another great gift for a pregnant woman is to pamper her with a one-hour pregnancy massage.  In case you are not certified yourself in massage therapy or prenatal massage, you can now get a prenatal massage at our pregnancy spa located within our studio.

Other great Christmas gifts for pregnant women:

• Rocking chair

Believe it or not, rocking chairs are not just for grandmothers.  As pregnant women progress through their pregnancy, they have an  increasing desire for a comfortable place to sit.  And the rocking chair continues to be useful even after the baby is born as it makes a perfect place to breastfeed your baby.  Where can you get a good rocking chair?  From personal experience, the best way is to shop for a rocking chair off-line.  Yes, actually go to a physical store, such as Baby’s R Us so she can try out different rocking chairs. 

• Maternity clothes

As her husband/boyfriend, you are in the unique position to know what would look good on her.  While she may have already bought a lot of maternity clothes with one thing in mind–what will be the most comfortable, you can buy something specially catered to what would look great on her.  This can include maternity jeans, maternity sleepwear, maternity lingerie, and other maternity dresses.  Not all maternity clothes have to be large, pink, and baggy.  A sleek fitted black dress that stretches as the belly grows makes for a great gift.

• Pregnancy pillow

Give your pregnant loved one the gift she craves–sleep!  The pregnancy pillow helps with back pain and helps her find the right position so she can sleep.  Also, she will probably continue to use the pillow after the baby is born as a place for nursing, a rest area, and a play area for the newborn baby.

We want to hear from pregnant women who loved their gifts they received for the holidays on previous years.  What worked and what didn’t?  Any horrible gifts we should avoid?

This article caught my eye.  It’s about a woman who brings in a cardboard cutout of the dad into the delivery room with her when she gives birth to her baby.  Her husband is deployed overseas, and I guess he was not allowed to have leave from his deployment to come home for the birth of his baby.

The article can be found here, and I have included it below.

A woman who went into labor without her husband in town decided he should be there anyway – so she brought a cardboard cutout of the baby daddy into the maternity ward with her.

Her son’s first pictures will include daddy – sort of.

Emily Marsh’s husband is a Marine serving overseas. Flat Darrell is his stand-in, originally sent her way as a joke during their engagement. The sort of tool used by many military families to help their kids bridge the gap while their real parent is gone, the life-size cutouts are also know as Flat Daddies.

But they usually spend time with little kids who are missing their parents. They’re not used to introduce a newborn to said parent.

Fortunately Emily Marsh is not crazy. Just a woman missing her husband who has a good sense of humor. Darrell will get to meet little Walter in June, she told the Charlotte Observer. Until then, he’ll have to make do with pictures – sort of like his son.

The original news story was first reported in the Charlotte Observer.

At First Peek Ultrasound, we have enough space in our ultrasound room to fit 10 to 12 people.  We can also fit up to 10 to 12 cardboard cutouts of  the baby’s dad and his entire military squad who may also want to attend the event of seeing your baby for the first time in 3D.  Now, even his battle buddies in Iraq or Afghanistan will be able to virtually attend this beautiful and breathtaking event.  

If your husband / fiance / partner / boyfriend is deployed overseas with the military, to Iraq, Afghanistan, or anywhere else, feel free to bring a cardboard cutout of your baby’s dad to our ultrasound studio.  Not only will we not make fun of you, your cardboard cutout daddy will be able to “see” your baby live in 3D on our two large plasma television screens while standing comfortably near you.  And you can get an extra CD of pictures to send to your loved one overseas for no extra charge.

At First Peek Ultrasound, we have had quite a few military moms come in, and a few of them have had the dads deployed overseas.   A 3D ultrasound is an excellent way of helping Dad stay connected with the baby and the pregnancy process in spite of him being so far away.  At First Peek Ultrasound, we can provide a DVD of the entire ultrasound session that you can send to Dad.  Also, you can upload your 4D ultrasound movie onto Youtube, so he can see it from anywhere in the world.

Are you pregnant with a Dad who is deployed overseas?  We would love to hear how a 3D ultrasound helped him connect and bond with you and your baby through your pregnancy.

Because I know that many of you may not have time to read the entire series of articles, I will just write my final point here:  Ob/gyn physicians do not approve of  3D and 4D ultrasound services only and precisely because they are not the ones profiting from this service. 

Although a few ob/gyn’s are clearly motivated in their discouragment of the practice for this profit motive (and I will pinpoint these ob/gyn physicians at a later date), many ob/gyn physicians do not have such a clear intention in their minds, and their discouragement of the practice may be more unconsciously influenced by the fact that they are not profiting from the service.  This is much the same way as physicians have been found to increase their recommendation of drugs that happen to be advertised on the pens that they write with which have been given to them by drug reps. 

Other ob/gyn physicians simply follow the advice of these aforementioned ob/gyn physicians, until it has gotten to the point where there has developed a culture of disdain for 3D ultrasound services.  This disdain is not rooted on any solid ground, although there are many reasons that ob/gyn physicians have brought up once this disdain has set in.

To further prove the point, a few ob/gyn physicians have opened up 3D ultrasound practices themselves, proving the point that that 3D ultrasounds are bad unless they own the 3D ultrasound facility themselves.

As part of the series, I will explore each of the reasons that ob/gyn physicians hate 3D ultrasounds and often tell their pregnant patients not to get this service, thus depriving these pregnant women of the opportunity to see and bond with their baby in this unique way.

This series of articles is meant to be a controversial, no holds barred, account.  I will definitely anger and upset some ob/gyn physicians.  And for that, I would like to apologize in advance to the ob/gyn physicians who do silently recommend my services to their patients and who have to work with these angry ob/gyn physicians.

In this article, I will attack head on the notion that 3D ultrasounds are wrong because they are elective and not necessary.  I will show that many ob/gyn physicians do not actually care about what is actually medically necessary or not.  When it comes down to it, many ob/gyn physicians will go along with something that is not medically necessary if it provides them more money or more convenience.  This can be seen in the elective C-section rate, which has been increasing steadily.

The following article discusses elective inductions of labor.  Again, elective inductions of labor are, by definition, not medically necessary.  Yet 20% of pregnancies are induced, and 10% of pregnancies are induced electively, by ob/gyn doctors, according to the following article, taken from MSNBC, and can be also seen here.

WASHINGTON – Hoping to schedule your baby’s birth while your mother’s in town, or before the doctor goes on vacation? Labor is becoming less of a late-night surprise, but some hospitals are starting to tighten the rules for elective deliveries — because some babies are being delivered too early.

More hospitals are expected to crack down as regulators begin new quality measurements next spring that aim to reduce too-early elective inductions and first-time cesareans.

Induced labor is on the rise for lots of reasons, some medical and some not. But recent research shows a troubling link between elective inductions and these so-called “late preemies.” These aren’t the dire too-small babies that the word premature conjures, but near-term babies who nonetheless are at higher risk of breathing disorders and other problems than babies who finish their very last weeks in the womb.

 “It was an ‘aha’ moment for me,” recalls Dr. Bryan Oshiro of his visit to a Utah intensive care nursery several years ago, where neonatologists pointed to babies there simply because they’d been induced too soon.

New guidelines will require that a mother’s cervix be nearly ready for natural labor, and limit the hospital beds available for elective inductions.

More hospitals are expected to start enforcing that criteria this spring, when the Joint Commission that regulates health quality will require hospitals to report all elective deliveries and the gestational age to its public database, providing peer pressure for improvement. Hospitals also will have to report cesareans for first-time mothers, too often a result of a failed induction.

“That’s not a good outcome for the baby or the mom,” says Joint Commission President Dr. Mark Chassin. “We believe this will be a very important driver of improvement in perinatal care.”

1 in 4 inductions were before 39 weeks
National guidelines from the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists have long discouraged elective deliveries before the 39th week of pregnancy. But some hospitals that took a close look were surprised. At Utah’s Intermountain Healthcare, for example, 28 percent of elective deliveries were breaking ACOG’s rule in 2001, Oshiro told a March of Dimes meeting on preventable prematurity this month.

Most were being induced in week 37, such a small difference that local obstetricians argued it wasn’t a problem. So Oshiro pulled the medical charts and found those near-term babies had more than double the risk of ending up in neonatal ICU, suffering respiratory distress, even needing a ventilator.

It took several years of policing: Inductions now are allowed only after meeting a checklist of requirements. But today, only about 3 percent of Intermountain’s elective deliveries occur before 39 weeks — and infant hospitalizations have dropped, saving money, too, says Oshiro, now a maternal-fetal medicine specialist at Loma Linda University in California. He’s about to pilot a similar program at hospitals in that area.

“If there’s no need to intervene, please don’t intervene,” is Oshiro’s message.

1 in 5 new moms induced
Labor is induced in more than one in five births, double the rate in 1990, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Many cases are for clear health reasons, such as a problem with the fetus or a sick mom or a pregnancy that has dragged well beyond the woman’s due date. 

There’s little data on how many are elective. But a Hospital Corporation of America study of nearly 18,000 births at 27 of its hospitals around the country suggests 10 percent of all births are performed electively before the 39-week mark. (That date is considered the point at which doctors can be sure a pregnancy has reached full-term, typically defined as 40 weeks give or take about a week.)

There are many reasons to perform an elective induction, such as if mom lives two hours from a hospital, notes Dr. John Fisch of the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center’s Magee-Women’s Hospital.

Patient and doctor preference helped drive the rise in inductions, such as women timing grandma’s arrival to take care of the siblings, or minimizing 3 a.m. deliveries. Then there’s defensive medicine, where doctors worried about litigation induce for minor reasons like a slight uptick of the mother’s blood pressure.

So Pittsburgh also had “a little bit of a hard sell” after discovering nearly 12 percent of elective deliveries broke the 39-week rule in 2004, Fisch says. “It was perceived to be a safe and effective way in delivering a baby — and it is, as long as it meets certain criteria.”

After Magee began strict enforcement — requiring that a mother’s cervix be nearly ready for natural labor, and limiting the beds available for elective inductions — too-early inductions dropped to 4 percent by 2007 and are “effectively zero” today, Fisch says. Overall, elective inductions dropped 30 percent.

When ob/gyn physicians as a whole have been found to perform elective inductions in 10% of pregnant women, as a matter of convenience, whether it is for the physician’s convenience or the mother’s, then they have no basis at all to make the argument that 3D ultrasounds should not be performed because it is not medically necessary.

3D ultrasounds are not performed for the mother’s convenience or simply for entertainment.  3D ultrasounds, along with many other services and products that have been used by pregnant women for centuries, have served to fulfill a deep need of pregnant women and the dads to see and bond with their unborn baby.

It has been shown that 3D ultrasounds increase the bonding between mother and unborn child.  This is probably due to the very real emotional connection that occurs when visually seeing your child.  This should not be trivialized just because it is not medically necessary.  There are many things that are not medically necessary and yet still can fulfill a real need in society, such as weddings and baby showers.  The 3D ultrasound can be yet another rite of passage of pregnancy.

If you are pregnant and believe that your 3D ultrasound fulfilled a need, whether it felt like a biological need, emotional need, psychological need, or spiritual need, we would love to hear your perspective.

Next: Is the 3D ultrasound machine a medical device, and can medical devices only be used for medical purposes?  We’ll see what ob/gyn’s say and what they actually do.