Due date or birth date?

When reading books like...You Baby's First Year: Week by Week or signing up for a web site like Baby Center, which date do you go by? Their due date or their birth date? My twins were 4 weeks & 2 days early.

I don't hold much stock in these books/sites as being the difinitive answer, but find they are worthwhile when I know very little about infant development and am looking for a guide.

 

I have heard to always use their Adjusted age, or their due date.

 

my girls were 4 weeks early and the pedi even goes by their bday. i think the adjusted age is used for 34 weekers and under

 

When I was pregnant I used due date. After I changed everything to birth date.

 

Same as Lindsay, we go by birthdate. My girls were born 37.2 and the pedi never did adjusted age with them.

 

Definitely go by due date (adjusted age). Even 36 weekers are still a whole month early! They can't be expected to be on the same page as a full-term newborn. Coming out of the womb early does not fast-forward them to the maturity of a 40-wk baby.

As to what pedis use - a lot of them are just plain ignorant. Mine has NO understanding of adjusted age (and my babies were born at 34 wks). :mellow:

 

There is such a huge 'range of normal'. I would first look at birth date, and if they are lagging, I would look at adjusted age, and if they are still not hitting milestones, I would bring it up to the ped.

 

Since they were only a little over 4 weeks early, I went by birth date. It gave me some ideas of what to expect even though the girls were always at the late end of normal.

 

QUOTE(fuchsiagroan @ Apr 27 2008, 07:27 PM) [snapback]742374[/snapback]
Definitely go by due date (adjusted age). Even 36 weekers are still a whole month early! They can't be expected to be on the same page as a full-term newborn. Coming out of the womb early does not fast-forward them to the maturity of a 40-wk baby.

As to what pedis use - a lot of them are just plain ignorant. Mine has NO understanding of adjusted age (and my babies were born at 34 wks). :mellow:


I have to disagree with this, mine were born 4 weeks early, and we NEVER used an adjusted age. In fact they have a friend 2 1/2 months older and they did everything within 2 months of her doing it, so I would have to say they were right on schedule developmentally. The reason most don't use adjusted age really unless they are 34 but most times 32 weeks, is because the last 6 weeks in utero pretty much all development is done, so all they are doing is growing, not developing. Unless they are showing significant deficits, I would just use their birthday.

 

I used their birth date (mine were born at 37 weeks), but just adjusted in my head when I thought it was necessary. At only 3-4 weeks early, they will probably be a bit "behind" for the first couple of months, but may well catch up after that. I found that they did hit many early milestones a couple of weeks late (smiling, finding their hands, sleeping longer stretches, passing the "fussy peak"), but after 3 months, there was no difference.

 

We use birth date as does our pedi. The girls on on target in terms of developmental milestones for their birth date so it would not make sense to adjust their age for their due date. They were born at 35w, 6d so we were 8 days away from our induction date.

 

I always went by their birth date, but would look at adjusted age things as well. To me their birth date was how old they were so that is what I went by, but took into consideration that they were early. After they turned 1, I never used adjusted age for anything.

 

My babies were born at 35 weeks and I use their birth date. I keep in the back of my mind that they were 4 weeks early so if they don't hit a milestone, I don't worry. My pedi doesn't use adjusted age for them.

 

We use birthdate and they were born at 32 weeks. But just as some pp's if they are slow to master a milestone then we always would say they have 2 months to make it. We have not had any issues by doing it that way. But I do have to agree that even 4 weeks early can be a reason to use adjusted age.

 

QUOTE
The reason most don't use adjusted age really unless they are 34 but most times 32 weeks, is because the last 6 weeks in utero pretty much all development is done, so all they are doing is growing, not developing.


Hmm, that's interesting, I'd heard otherwise. We had Early Intervention for a year (no delays or issues, we just automatically had EI due to the combination of prematurity and DS's low birth weight), and they always used adjusted age - they talked about using it for 36 week babies too. One one of their last visits, they mentioned a recent study that said it can take babies born in the "30's" 2-3 yrs to catch up, and 5-6 yrs for babies in the "20's".

Lots of different opinions out there, I guess! ardon: But anyway, there is certainly a big range of "normal" as far as development goes.

 

My girls were born at 34w6d and the Ped always uses the birthdate for developmental assessment. My girls have always been right on track even using birthdate. There really is such a wide range of normal. I would only be concerned if they were way outside normal range.