A practical guide to understanding fetal growth and newborn birthweight charts

Abstract

Appropriate assessment of fetal growth is essential for safe clinical care. There have been many recent strategies to improve the detection of aberrant fetal growth patterns, one of which has been to optimize fetal growth centile charts. Over recent years there has been ongoing debates regarding the optimal growth chart for clinical usage. Controversy can arise where growth charts have demonstrated wide variance in the proportion of fetuses classified within the extremities of growth. Standards for growth charts need to be evidenced based and validated against pregnancy outcomes to demonstrate clinical utility and widespread usage. They should be supplied by high quality methodological reasoning and ideally evidenced through large prospective multicentre studies. Given the variable terminology to classify growth centile charts, including the variety of charts available, a complete understanding by healthcare professional can be troublesome to achieve. This practical guide aims to provide clarity on this diverse subject.