How Can You Tell You Are Having Twins?

The diagnosis of twins is not as easy as it might be thought. Even though the mother has regular examinations by the midwife and doctor and they listen to the heartbeats of the babies, the second infant may be so placed inside the mother’s womb that he just can’t be heard or detected – and of course twins tend to be smaller babies than singletons.

But doctors are alerted to the possibility of twins by some signs in pregnancy, especially in a mother with a family history of twins, or who has been taking a fertility drug.

For example, a uterus that is consistently larger than it should be for the dates of pregnancy will concern him. Even though twins are smaller than singletons, together they are bigger than a singleton, and the uterus shows this.

Later on when the baby starts to move there may be so much movement that the mother may suspect the possibility of a larger crowd inside her than she expected.

Another clue is finding rather too many ‘lumps and bumps’ at examination of the mother’s abdomen.

Experienced midwives and doctors can feel the baby’s parts and identify them -head, arms, legs – and feeling two head-like bumps is a definitely suspicious circumstance.

Other medical clues involve the amount of liquid in which the babies float (excessive waters often develop, leading to a dramatic enlargement of the size of the uterus at around the twenty-fourth week). Finally, of course, careful checks using fetal monitoring techniques will show the presence of two babies.

Even with all these pointers, however, about five per cent of all twin births reach delivery undiagnosed – which startles the parents and somewhat embarrasses the doctor and midwife.

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