How To Determine Your Due Date

Dr. Neelu Dr. Neelu May 27, 2019 1229 0

How To Determine Your Due Date

Want to know when your baby is due? Normally, women can calculate a due date by adding 280 days (40 weeks) to the first day of your last menstrual period (assuming a 28 day cycle). Even over the internet ,there are pregnancy due date calculators easily available, which a pregnant woman can use to work out roughly when the baby is due to be born, working from the first day of your last period.

How can I determinate my due date

The normal pregnancy usually lasts for 40 weeks from the first day of your last menstrual period or 38 weeks from your conception. If you know the date of your last menstrual period or the date of conception that some women do, addition to your cycles are regular, you can easily determine your due date just by sitting at home.

Based on LMP:

If your menstrual period cycle is normal and that is for 28 days, then you can easily detect the expected due date just by adding 9 months plus 7 days to the first day of your last menstrual period (LPM). Let’s try to understand it with the help of an example – if your last menstrual period began on 12 May 2019, then your expected due date (EDD) would be on 20 Feb 2020.

Based on the date of Conception

If your menstrual periods are normal, that is 28 days long and you know your date of conception, then you can easily determine your due date just by subtracting 7 days and after that adding 9 months to it. Most of the time, this method will probably not going to work for most of the women, unless they have had intercourse only once during the fertile period of that cycle and remember the date. 

How do the doctors determine the due date?

Most of the doctors generally use two of the methods to determine the due date for giving birth to their child – abdominal examination and ultrasound scan. In both of the methods, the pregnant woman has to frequently visit the doctor so that your doctor can do regular checkup regarding the size and growth of the baby. The most accurate due date computed depends on the last ultrasound. Remember that these dates are just simply estimation for the final due date, hence these dates will help to get the final due date. 

Can different methods give a different due date

And the answer is – YES! Most of the time each due date calculating method will give you a different due date but these dates will generally vary by a couple of days. If the woman has an irregular menstrual cycle, as her cycles are very long or very short, then in this case the LMP method will not be able to track the accurate due date. Therefore, in this case, ultrasound scan method will be most accurate.