Understanding your pregnancy:

During pregnancy, your body goes through many changes. Some common symptoms of early pregnancy include:

• One or more missed periods.
• Nausea or change in appetite.
• Breasts are swollen and/or tender.
• Mood swings.
• Feeling like you have to urinate more frequently.
• Feeling more tired than normal.
• Recent weight gain or loss.

You do not have to wait for a missed period to take our test.

Choices Pregnancy Center offers a free pregnancy test that you will perform that will measure the human chorionic gonadotropin (hCG) level in your urine. In a normal pregnancy, hCG can be detected in serum as early as 7 - 10 days following conception.

Pregnancy begins when the male's sperm fertilizes or joins with the female ovum (egg). The average duration of pregnancy is 38 to 42 weeks and is divided into three trimesters: 1 day to 12 weeks; 13 to 26 weeks; and 26 weeks to birth.

If you have a positive test we will make a referral to an appropriate health care provider for confirmation. Your doctor may request an ultrasound exam to confirm the status of your pregnancy. This information is important whether your are considering abortion or continuing with your pregnancy.

"Last Menstrual Period" (LMP) It is helpful to know the date of the LMP. This is the date when a woman started her last menstrual period before fertilization. This is the point in time from which the pregnancy and the age of the unborn baby are measured.

Ultrasound Sonograms

We provide free sonograms for clients when medically indicated for pregnancy viability. We have sonography equipment which allows us to provide a vaginal sonogram as early as 7 weeks after conception. If you are considering an abortion, it is important to determine if you have a viable pregnancy.
Please contact us us for more information.

Why do prenant women have ultrasounds?

At the beginning of pregnancy the most common reason for having an ultrasound is to assess the developing pregnancy. For women considering abortion, this is very useful for making a well-informed decision. The ultrasound will give information about how far along the pregnancy is, the position and size of the embryo, the number of embryos, and the heartbeat.

If there is the possibility of a miscarriage or an ectopic pregnancy (ie. pregnancy in the tube), an ultrasound can provide significant information to help evaluate either of those possibilities. Miscarriage occurs in 15-20% of known pregnancies. About 1 in 50 pregnancies are ectopic. If one of these situations exists, then abortion may not be medically necessary and may be a potentially hazardous procedure. Therefore, a positive pregnancy test should never be the only determining factor in the decision to have an abortion.

Who will do the ultrasound?

An ultrasound scan must be done under doctor's orders. Medical personnel who are trained to do ultrasounds perform the procedure. At CHOICES, ultrasounds are done by our Registered Diagnostic Medical Sonographers (RDMS). The report from the ultrasound will be read and signed by a doctor. The procedure takes about 30-45 minutes and offers valuable knowledge during pregnancy. At CHOICES, our goal is to provide you with accurate and up-to-date information about pregnancy and abortion so that you can make a fully informed decision about your pregnancy. Contact CHOICES at 412-264-0200 for more information about scheduling an ultrasound.

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