Clinics in Mother and Child Health

Abstract

The Vanishing Triplet

Pi-Hua Chen

Vanishing fetuses are frequently encountered in pregnancies results from in vitro fertilization. Ultrasound scans taken at the 4-5th weeks showed multiple gestation has occurred, it frequently happens that more than one amniotic sac can be seen in early pregnancy, whereas a few weeks later there is only one to be seen and the other has disappeared. Whereas the triplet pregnancy evolved into a normal twin gestation, and may further evolve into a singleton gestation. These very high resorption rates, which can be explained on the basis of the intense fetal competition for space, nutrition, or other factors during early gestation with frequent loss of the other fetus. Here, we report a case of a vanishing triplet of spontaneous pregnancy, one fetus vanished in the first month of pregnancy while another fetus disappeared at the end of second month. The normal pregnancy of the singleton was followed up until six months.