Baby Kick Count Monitors
Keeping “kick counts” is recommended by most doctors late in the second trimester. To do a kick count, you count the number of movements or kicks. After you get to 10 squiggles, rolls, kicks or flutters, you note how long it took from the beginning to the end of the session.
Research done in th 1970′s and 1980′s determined that kick counts were a pretty accurate indicator of a baby’s health. Therefore, if your kick count session become longer as your pregnancy advances, or your baby just isn’t moving, you should call your health care provider.
With my last pregnancy, I felt that something wasn’t right. My child wasn’t moving as he had previously, and I mentioned that to my doctor who wasn’t very concerned. I continued to monitor my child’s movements and they continued to decrease over the following few days which prompted me to again contact the doctor. After that, I had to go for bi-weekly tests to more thoroughly monitor my son. While the child was becoming more lethargic, no one seemed to know why. Some of the staff told me to not even bother worrying.
When my son was born, we found that he had 2 knots in his umbilical cord.  That was the reason for the kick count decline: if he moved or laid in a certain position, it most certainly would have reduced the amount of oxygen and nutrients he was getting.
The thing that frustrated me was that I felt that the health care providers were more or less complacent about the whole thing. It took some advocating on my part to even get additional monitoring for my child. Several doctors tried to tell me that my records were inaccurate or that I was worrying about nothing.
I saw a new product called the KickTrak which electronically monitors your baby’s kicks and movements. I am seriously considering buying the product, which costs about $30, mostly because I’ve had issues with all of my children towards the end of my pregnancies. Several of my deliveries were induced and my children were delivered early.
Would you purchase an electronic kick count monitor? Do you prefer to keep track of your baby’s movements in a journal?
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