Pregnancy : 27 Week

Fetal presentation and position:
Her lungs, liver and immune system still need some time to mature, but if your baby was to be born now, she would do alright with some medical assistance. Week 27 marks the end of your second trimester.

Your baby is rather comfortable with her head up because she fits in your uterus better this way. But when you visit your doctor, he might tell you that the baby is lying in a breech position. Don't let this bother you. Before the 27th week of pregnancy, almost 40% of all fetuses are not in the preferred vertex, or head-down, presentation. Between weeks 27-37 that number drops to nearly 17% as the babies turn on their own. And before birth, between weeks 38-40, only 3-5% of babies are not in the vertex presentation.

When your doctor or midwife mentions the term presentation, he means which of the baby's body parts first enters your pelvis. The word position refers to which way your baby is facing. The optimum birth position is occiput anterior, where the back of the baby's head faces forward. (Occiput posterior position often slows down the progress of labor and causes more back discomfort. Babies often turn on their own during labor to the preferred occiput anterior position.)