I have a lot of questions

[hall.nick1781]

Hello everyone,
I recently took in 2 Holland lops, named Buster and Alice. On July 20th I took them in for a health check and vets confirmed Alice is pregnant (said ultrasound showed follicles but not heartbeats yet) I contacted previous home and they said she’s had 2 litters before, so she’s experienced. Today she started going crazy building a nest, and has even pulled a little fur. How long should it be before I expect babies? My vet told me she would most likely absorb the babies, but judging by her abdomen growth I’m guessing she’s still pregnant. Thanks for the help!

 

[ladysown]

can you give her straw, hay, or paper litter with which to build a nest and give her some place (like a cardboard box 2 inches bigger than her all round) in which to have her babies. Lops tend to kindle right on day 31, so if they know when she was bred, put her birthing box in a couple days before she is due.

REMOVE THE BUCK!!!! Otherwise one month later you'll be weaning kits early and dealing with another batch of kits.

 

[Heartbased Homestead]

Congratulations on the baby buns! Ultrasounds are not needed in animals or humans. The ultrasound itself is harmful to fetal tissue.

 

[hall.nick1781]

Congratulations on the baby buns! Ultrasounds are not needed in animals or humans. The ultrasound itself is harmful to fetal tissue.

Thank you but I’ve already had the ultrasound done.

 

[hall.nick1781]

can you give her straw, hay, or paper litter with which to build a nest and give her some place (like a cardboard box 2 inches bigger than her all round) in which to have her babies. Lops tend to kindle right on day 31, so if they know when she was bred, put her birthing box in a couple days before she is due.

REMOVE THE BUCK!!!! Otherwise one month later you'll be weaning kits early and dealing with another batch of kits.

She has her nest box and she’s already built her nest using the hay

 

[Heartbased Homestead]

Thank you but I’ve already had the ultrasound done.

Yes I know, I'm sorry I meant to add the caveat that was just for other viewers/new members to question ultrasounds

 

[eco2pia]

Yes I know, I'm sorry I meant to add the caveat that was just for other viewers/new members to question ultrasounds

please explain the mechanism by which you believe an ultrasound harms fetal tissue, and where you found this information. I am all for learning new things, but this is not a widely accepted opinion, and could use a little further information.

 

[Scooter1A]

it's just not necessary but if you want to spend the money......

 

[kusanar314]

it's just not necessary but if you want to spend the money......

That would be my opinion as well, but Heartbased Homestead was saying that it is actually harmful to the kits.

 

[hall.nick1781]

it's just not necessary but if you want to spend the money......

It actually wasn’t as expensive as I expected. It was more expensive for my dog to have it done than the rabbit lol.

 

[Heartbased Homestead]

For sure eco2pia. I should've included in my last post but sometimes I'm prone to silencing myself and cutting off info after an abrupt controversial statement. I should really focus on being more gentle and giving more info with my controversial topics.

I think the first time I was made aware of this was listening to the taking back birth podcast during my first child's pregnancy. After researching the info presented within, I made the decision to not have any ultrasounds and I believe the decision saved my births.

I'm going to quote the transcripts of the podcast which stuck out to me, since the internet search engines have been gutted and I cannot find the studies which previously convinced me.

How to lower risks:

risks and effects for ultrasound are going to be greater when the scan is longer. That may play into somebody's risk and benefit assessment such as bleeding. It's really pretty simple and quick for a good ultrasound technician to scan the uterus for a source of bleeding. It doesn't take more than a couple minutes as opposed to this level two measuring extravaganza that can take up to an hour, sometimes more, sometimes less. But the risks and effects are more for longer scans, and women have to know that.
It's the time exposed as well as the output of individual machines. And because we don't know the output of individual machines, some are more, some are less as far as strength of the essentially radiation that they are producing, then we do have to be concerned with the time that women and babies are being exposed.

Lack of safety studies:

Another note about that is that some of the studies I'll refer to later and many of the studies that were done in the eighties when ultrasound really became a thing were done with an exposure time of about three minutes. So I find that frightening because many of these studies, more as opposed to less, do not report that ultrasound is safe in any way and never have. But they were only studying roughly three minute exposure periods. That is frightening when you think of a woman enduring 60 plus minutes.
And the equipment used in the eighties was not as strong as it is today. Again, as far as the radiation put out. So there are some major differences already in the last couple decades with ultrasound. And it's important that women take that into consideration. It's not what it once was. And it was never safe.

Neither safe nor effective:

We're going to talk about some studies that definitely say it's dangerous. But have we considered that it's actually ineffective? I mean I think that's huge. Dangerous is huge. Ineffective is huge because we're involving mass amounts of women and babies.

What is ultrasound:

So let's go back to basics here for those of you that need a primer or a review. What is ultrasound technology? What is it? Because then you'll understand why it's not a good thing. So there's tons of descriptions online. You can read the rest of the day about ultrasound. But I like to just think about it simply—explain it simply—so that we understand what it means to the baby because that, as a mother, is my main concern. I'm sure there are risks to mom to have her uterus ultrasounded. But, frankly, the baby is my concern.
So it uses high frequency sound waves to look into parts of the body. So, again, a baby in a uterus is one thing that can be ultrasounded or looked at with ultrasound technology. But any part of your body, especially the organs in particular, can be looked at. We're using high frequency sound

So ultrasound meaning the one you see on the screen or sonogram some people call them—it uses pulsed waves. So the waves of sound pulse. It's not continuous. The Doppler, however, uses a continuous wave. So Doppler is stronger—well, you would have to compare other things. But the fact that it's continuous makes it sort of more aggressive towards the baby. So I think that shatters the myth that your midwife coming into your house listening to a—listening with a Doppler is somehow safer or safe. It's not. It's actually not at all.
There are the same risks that there are to a baby appearing on a screen with ultrasound technology because it is indeed the same technology. So think about that one because I can't tell you how many midwives I've come across in my life that routinely pull out a Doppler at every appointment for normal, healthy moms and normal, healthy babies. It's absolutely ridiculous. Learn to use a fetoscope.

Brain and other organ damage, unsafe:

when we're looking at a baby or a fetus really that is 18-20 weeks in the uterus—gestation—there is a loss of brain cells. This heat is killing off brain cells that this baby very much needs as we all do but especially because this baby is growing. And this loss of brain cells will not be reversed. So there you have it. The studies on humans and the effects of ultrasound include—and this is a short list. I mean really. Preterm birth, miscarriage, low birth weight, dyslexia, more of a use of the left hand—dominance with left hand, delayed speech development, intrauterine growth retardation. So these are things that have been studied despite the lack of public knowledge since the seventies and eighties. And ultrasound became a routine part of OB care in the seventies. So it hasn't been that long. I was born in the seventies. There has not been enough time to see what the effects are.

Ineffective:

But, again, many of these women are just having routine ultrasounds at every visit, so maybe it's not so special anymore. I don't know. The dating is not as accurate. So an ultrasound done in early pregnancy is going to be more accurate for dating purposes, if you were unsure about that. But that's not the main concern with the level two because, frankly, it's just not that accurate. And that's not why most of these are being done. So this kind of blew my mind. The level two routine ultrasound misses—misses—up to 40 percent of abnormalities. Right?
So what's the point of this? Why are we measuring femurs if this procedure can't actually detect abnormalities? I mean isn't this why women are going.

Ineffective as another element of danger... 1st by the stressed caused by false positives (in human pregnancies, in rabbit pregnancies the stress of being taken to a vet), 2nd the missing of false negatives and our trust in unreliable technology rather than reling on our best understanding as the official authority to give diagnosis:

But missing up to 40 percent of abnormalities is unacceptable, frankly, for a technology that is this routine. So these are false negatives, right? The mom is sent home, told everything is great, fine, perfect. And there is actually something wrong with her baby.
Another possibility that we've all heard of is the baby scanned can be—the doctor or the tech will say that there's something wrong with the baby. And this—I've known friends that have had this happen. It causes extreme amounts of anxiety and stress. They don't know what's true. They don't know what's false. They have to go for repeat ultrasounds to try and figure it out. And sometimes it's a transient something meaning something looks a little bit off with the baby particularly the skull or brain development. But it's just the gestation the baby is at or perhaps user error. And by the time, they repeat ultrasound everything looks perfectly normal. So, again, total stress attack for these situations.

In regards to human mothers:

How much of this information coming from the outside messes with what we need to develop, cultivate, and grow to become mothers? I think that's my biggest question. And that's the one that I wish we could offer to mothers along with this information about risks and benefits. How do you see yourself becoming a mother? How does that happen? What was your mother like? What was your childhood like? How do you want to start fresh to be a mother to this person? Right? Because we all have mothering things from our past as children. And we can change, and we can do things differently.
So how do we want to be mothers? Do we want to look to the outside? Do we want to expose our babies to dangerous technology for immediate gratification?

Here's the link to the podcast to anyone who's interested in listening to the whole episode.

 

[eco2pia]

Sorry for the the following essay. Nerd-me could not resist--if you are not a nerd, or if nerdy science chicks annoy you, I apologize, and please feel free to skip this post. There is almost no relevance to rabbits contained in this post.

<shortened for brevity...>
Here's the link to the podcast to anyone who's interested in listening to the whole episode.

That was interesting, thank you for taking the time to post this.

As a scientist, I have access to more resources than most, and I HIGHLY recommend that all people interested in scientific and medical studies use PubMed searches for research. This is a reliable source for finding peer-reviewed science literature spanning back decades, and helpful when hot topics fall off the mainstream radar and disappear from top google results.

Unfortunately the information found there is often angled at scientists as an audience, and so the jargon can make it difficult to read unless you have a background in research, also many journal articles are behind a paywall. Additionally, it is worth noting that not all studies are created equal--a study showing an effect in 3 mice and never duplicated again is a fluke, especially when compared to 20 contradicting studies using data from thousands of subjects. That said, I am not an expert in fetal development, or in ultrasounds. I just have a lot of experience researching scientific literature.

I did a search on this topic and found a review article, "Benefits and risks of ultrasound in pregnancy"
which is a format that is meant to give a broad overview of the topic, and therefore is less technically worded. I am providing the link, which shows the summary, but the rest of the article is unfortunately behind a paywall. Fortunately, I have access to the full article, thanks to my academic associations. I can send a PDF to anyone who requests it in a personal message--you will need to give me an email address.

The gist of the article is summed by this quote:
"Diagnostic ultrasound has been used clinically for over
half-a-century without reports of harmful effects in humans,
despite demonstration of such effects in cell cultures and
various laboratory animals. Ideally, epidemiological studies
should be performed on large populations, blindly random-
izing 50% to ultrasound testing and 50% to no testing. "

There have been studies showing potential to harm cells in cell cultures and in cases of small lab animals (mice, chickens) but none showing harm in humans. The prevailing opinion is that the potential in humans to offer early diagnosis of birth defects outweighs the vanishingly small potential for any human fetal harm--of which there has never been a documented incident. I was unable to find any documented case of HUMAN brain cells being affected by ultrasound. I was able to find a reference to fetal (pre-hatch) chicken brain cells being affected by ultrasound.

It may be interesting to note that we can easily "cure" cancer in mice. However, most of us realize that we cannot always treat cancer effectively in humans. Not all animal models are accurate representations for human medicine. Making that leap of assumption, and then conflating it into a foregone conclusion, is not good science. Reporting that unfounded conclusion to other people as a known fact is not good journalism. The only correlation actually found in human studies was a slight increase of left-handedness in male fetuses who had received ultrasounds, and such things can occur by chance rather than by an actual causal effect.

I want to make it very clear: I am not faulting or criticising @Heartbased Homestead at all--I fully believe their intentions were good, and I am grateful for their willingness to post their reasoning and sources. Also, everything said in the podcast about lack of 100% accuracy of ultrasounds in predicting fetal outcomes is more or less correct--there ARE absolutely harms to the parents when a misdiagnosis occurs, whether that misdiagnosis is positive or negative. I just take issue with the idea that an ultrasound can physically damage or kill a human fetus--there is no evidence to support that statement that I was able to find.

Either way, I encourage everyone to look up and compare many sources, and do your research. While I do not believe that an ultrasound is a remotely life (or brain) threatening event for a human fetus, I also acknowledge that it is likely unnecessary in most cases, and foregoing it will also cause no harm. Mostly, I am interested in people approaching this topic and others without fear, and I am grateful for the ability to discuss it respectfully.

 

[Heartbased Homestead]

Beautiful post! And that you for your clarifications and caveats.

Please do not apologize for your intellect and commitment to research! I respect wholeheartedly this take. I rely more on philosophical logic and gut intuition - we have two differing approaches and yours is a lot more clean and palatable to the majority so I'm grateful you posted it.

The main reason I'm so adamant about questioning this status quo of the mainstream medical mafia's routines and procedures, is that I have experiential evidence; empirical evidence. This type of evidence is more personally valuable, but I understand to others it is not.

I am a fellow scientist, but I follow the scientific method: I test my ideas and share my conclusions with my peers. There are many scientists who's research is mostly comprised of reading other's work, that is noble too, it is just not the method which I personally base my conclusions on.

I am compelled to personally test my ideas, and I have to hear my peers conclusions (which came from their personal testing) and test those. Many who follow mainstream medical advice skip this step, relying on authorities, which is why we see the breakdown of society during times of high stress (2020 was a good peek into this phenomenon that causes the rapid degradation) they just don't have the inner tools to test, make conclusions for themselves, or present to their peers in the hopes that they will do the same and continue the process.

I am under no delusions that we could change society by exposing this gap in the science community between true peers and those who consider themselves "scientific authorities", but it's personally worth it to speak the plain facts as I see them. I'm compelled to not silence myself or others in this way. We are all worthy of and capable of adding to humanity's scientific knowledge - whether our work is considered "peer-reviewed" or is published in by a government-approved organization.

But what do you think of all this?

 

[Zee-Man]

... nerdy science chicks ...

Are the best!

 

[Cotton Rabbitry]

For sure eco2pia. I should've included in my last post but sometimes I'm prone to silencing myself and cutting off info after an abrupt controversial statement. I should really focus on being more gentle and giving more info with my controversial topics.

I think the first time I was made aware of this was listening to the taking back birth podcast during my first child's pregnancy. After researching the info presented within, I made the decision to not have any ultrasounds and I believe the decision saved my births.

I'm going to quote the transcripts of the podcast which stuck out to me, since the internet search engines have been gutted and I cannot find the studies which previously convinced me.

How to lower risks:


Lack of safety studies:


Neither safe nor effective:


What is ultrasound:



Brain and other organ damage, unsafe:


Ineffective:


Ineffective as another element of danger... 1st by the stressed caused by false positives (in human pregnancies, in rabbit pregnancies the stress of being taken to a vet), 2nd the missing of false negatives and our trust in unreliable technology rather than reling on our best understanding as the official authority to give diagnosis:


In regards to human mothers:


Here's the link to the podcast to anyone who's interested in listening to the whole episode.

I would have to disagree with the podcast and your opinion, As Ultrasound saved my child's life, Being older (40) when I had her I did not go into labor on my due date, but was actually naturally aborting my daughter. If not for the ultrasound, they would not have known what was going on during my entire pregnancy, nor would I have the beautiful child I have today of 10 going on 30 something.

 

[Heartbased Homestead]

I would have to disagree with the podcast and your opinion, As Ultrasound saved my child's life, Being older (40) when I had her I did not go into labor on my due date, but was actually naturally aborting my daughter. If not for the ultrasound, they would not have known what was going on during my entire pregnancy, nor would I have the beautiful child I have today of 10 going on 30 something.

I believe this is important for you and a valid conclusion. Thank you for sharing. I won't question it. But I also have experience with lack of ultrasounds saving my birth/babies life (actual experience not just what I've posted here but a real conclusion that if I would've had an ultrasound during birth - or been at the hospital - it very likely would've killed my baby). I have witnessed many women with birth trauma claim that the interventions which were traumatic saved their babies and lives when it was not the case. I'm not saying this is your story, I don't know your story and even if I did only you could be the ultimate authority on your understanding. I'm only advocating for what I understand and where I cannot adopt the same conclusions.

 

[CedarRidge]

Just sitting here eating my popcorn…

 

[Preitler]

Congratulations on the baby buns! Ultrasounds are not needed in animals or humans. The ultrasound itself is harmful to fetal tissue.

Nope.

Sorry, but no. I Know it's impossible to put all of ones experiences in a post, but your next post sounds irrational to me.

I reckon you're convinced of this, and to quite some extent I can sympathise with the notion that doctors relying on machines waste crucial time and sometimes misinterpret, or overrate the data, and forget about common sense, but demonizing Ultrasound is imo a shot in the completly wrong direction.

 

[Heartbased Homestead]

Nope.

Sorry, but no. I Know it's impossible to put all of ones experiences in a post, but your next post sounds irrational to me.

I reckon you're convinced of this, and to quite some extent I can sympathise with the notion that doctors relying on machines waste crucial time and sometimes misinterpret, or overrate the data, and forget about common sense, but demonizing Ultrasound is imo a shot in the completly wrong direction.

Opinion noted, sorry to disturb you.

 

[eco2pia]

I opened a can of worms here and I should not have. I set a poor example and I apologize.

Let's table the tangent and circle back to the topic of the original post, which I believe has been resolved.

@hall.nick1781 I deeply apologize for the thread hijack, it was very rude.