A 12 Week Scan Can Now Reveal Your Baby's Gender

It might sound a bit logical when you have scientifically backed theories to predict your baby’s gender. We have a lot of grandma’s tales in place already which might seem a bit overboard to the rational minds. Something called the Nub Theory also known as the ‘angle of the dangle’ foretells your baby’s gender at the 12-week scan! It means that you could know whether you are going to have a boy or a girl at your first visit for an ultrasound scan. While not everybody thinks that the theory really works, here’s more about the nub theory.

The nub theory suggests that your baby’s nub is its genital tube that occurs as a penis-like protuberance between legs where the genitals develop eventually. The nub looks almost the same in both the sexes, but a trained eye will be able to differentiate. Apparently, in the case of a baby boy, the nub points at 30 degrees or more and if it’s a baby girl, it will point at less than 30-degree angle.

Between the 11th and 14th weeks’ gestational period, both the genders have the penis-like protuberance which looks very similar at that point in time. If it is not the for the dangle 30 degrees up to about the backbone, then you wouldn’t be able to tell that it’s a boy. Similarly, for girls, the dangle must be below 30 degrees.

But for you to be able to figure out any difference, the fetus must not be nestled up and be as flat as possible. It becomes even more visible if the fetus is right side up. In the case of boys, the nub might be seen pointing up. In the case of a baby girl, the nub would be horizontal. The nub might be forked in both the genders.

You might not be able to tell the difference at 11 weeks, but at the 12th-week scan, there is a possibility of 75% accuracy. By the 13th-week scan, you can expect an accuracy of 95%.

There are however questions around the accuracy of predicting your baby’s gender through the nub theory. Apparently, no concrete scientific evidence can back the research as to whether the theory does work. Quite a few medics claim that at 12 weeks, it is just too early to foretell your baby’s gender. There is a lot of similarity between the male and female genitalia until the 14th or the 15th week of the scan, which can lead to inaccurate gender prediction.

Ideally, it might be difficult to recognize the protruding genitals till the time they are reasonably developed. Regardless of what your scan tells you, it might be ideal to wait and not get anxious about whether you will have a boy or a girl. There are cases where doctors have predicted the gender of a baby; it turns out to be otherwise.

You might want to wait till your 20th gestational week’s scan to get a more reliable outcome.

So while it may be a bit too early before this period to guess your baby’s gender, and given that the nub theory may or may not work, you might want to hold that shopping for your baby or getting the nursery ready and can indulge in some guessing games for the sake of fun.

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