[Music]
at first i was doing them every two
weeks
it's an industry that's thriving having
the reassurance from private scans has
it she got me through
many women say they help but is there a
risk of false reassurance
that's what i specifically paid for to
check for ectopic and
they got it so wrong we investigate
concerns about how scanning studios
operate
to embark on a scan of a woman who's
been bleeding is appalling
go inside a company whatsapp group which
reviews scans
i knew something was wrong straight away
didn't know what to do
here from a whistleblower who claims
problems will be missed
they want to be all singing all dancing
medical checks pictures
and it can't be done in a five to eight
minute scan
and ask whether there needs to be a
change regulations needed now we're
seeing a huge expansion of these clinics
[Music]
on our high streets one business is
booming
for many women pregnancy can be a really
anxious time
and they're keen to check on their
baby's health the nhs provides two scans
unless there's a clinical need for more
but more than 200 businesses now offer a
solution
reassurance scams
[Music]
hope thought she'd struggle to have
children because of previous ill health
hey hi hey how you doing yeah i'm good
thank you she says it made her
especially anxious when she became
pregnant
how you've been feeling um yeah not so
bad you feel like you're dreaming a
little bit i just couldn't believe it it
was like
such a big gift and then i thought what
if this doesn't last
she's now six months pregnant and has
had five private scans costing between
60 and 100 pounds each i put
all the pictures all over my wall he's
literally like the last thing i see at
night and the first thing i see in the
morning
she says being able to bring her
boyfriend along to the private ones
unlike nhs scams has made a real
difference
it's been the most relieving relieving
experience ever i like so i would go in
quite tense i'd have the most sleepless
night before
just with pure worry so when you then
come out of that and you know
everything's okay you're like
and i would say i feel like pretty
relieved for
maybe a good couple of days up to a week
and then i then the cycle then starts
again
do you think the private scans reduce or
increase your anxiety
i get what you mean is it reinforcing
the anxiety but
i found the relief being able to just
sleep at night and not worry even just
just for one night was just worth it
just to know that everything was okay
today
scans are carried out by sonographers
anyone can call themselves one
it's not a regulated profession like
being a midwife
companies offer a variety of services
including the chance to get souvenir
images or video
to find out the gender or check for
abnormalities
my children could have been without a
mother
[Music]
carriane felt anxious after recognising
pregnancy symptoms having undergone a
sterilising procedure
she was worried about her increased risk
of an ectopic pregnancy
where the fetus grows outside the womb
and so booked a scan at a studio run by
window to the womb in lisbon
it is contradicting himself fetus absent
and normal life
pregnancy even though the fetus couldn't
be seen
during the scan and despite her history
the studio recorded a normal pregnancy
a day later he began bleeding and went
to the nhs so i explained to
the hospital that i'd been for a private
ectopic scan that everything was fine i
wasn't
ectopic so they did re-scan me and
they didn't pick up the ectopic either
so i was
home believing that i was miscarrying
the bleeding continued two weeks later
she was sent to a
e my fallopian tubes had ruptured and my
stomach had filled with blood i was
arched from death
so there was no miscarriage it was an
ectopic pregnancy
the company says it's unable to comment
due to legal proceedings
[Applause]
revealing the baby's gender has become a
big part of many pregnancies
party gifts is an industry worth tens of
millions of pounds
we've spoken to a woman who had tended
to scan with window to the womb in
salford to check her baby's well-being
and record its gender for a party
we've learned the company identified a
serious abnormality incompatible with
life where part or all of the fetus's
head is missing called annenkeffele
but rather than refer her immediately to
hospital and provide
a medical report the woman was told the
baby's head couldn't be fully seen
and recommended to book an nhs anomaly
scan
it was absolutely immoral it was
disgusting they let this poor girl leave
and go to a gender reveal party name the
baby
open gifts and that baby couldn't live
they even gave a little girl a teddy
bear with a heartbeat
of her little sister she only found out
when she showed the scan images to a
family friend who's an experienced
sonographer
i saw the pictures in front of me and
the abnormality was so
obvious and so grotesque
i can't believe my eyes in all honesty i
had to break the news that
that baby couldn't live and i had to do
that over the telephone
and they were hysterical absolutely
hysterical
windows of the womb has said all its
staff are registered with the health and
care professions council
but we've learned the sonographer who
conducted the scan was not
at the time the mother wrote to the
company saying i feel betrayed
distraught and lost for words the
company apologized
it says the sonographer left shortly
afterwards and the incident led to best
practice being reinforced across its
branches
available from 15 weeks plus some
companies say they're not medical and
don't diagnose problems
one of these called meet your miracle
advertises reassurance scans which it
says
visualize well-being we've been passed
these messages from the company's
whatsapp group
which show sonographers and management
sharing and discussing customer scans
sometimes during appointments any ideas
at all
i've asked her outside one stenographer
told the group he felt guilty after
having to let a woman leave without
telling her about a possible serious
abnormality
i knew something was wrong straight away
didn't know what to do
i feel terrible at saying nothing and
i'm wrapped with guilt for not saying
anything
despite being a non-medical company
we've been told women are accepted for
scans who are bleeding and in pain
rather than being recommended to visit
the nhs first
the company said that scans are largely
recreational and under its registration
it can't discuss
any concerns unless they're relevant to
the baby's heartbeat
it says it advises women bleeding and in
pain to attend the nhs
but its service detecting a heartbeat is
invaluable in reducing anxiety
other companies do advertise medical
scans which diagnose abnormalities
window to the womb is one of the biggest
these leaked internal documents show
that three spina bifida cases were
missed in a single week in may
the mistakes were clearly visible
according to the company's directors
they described the cases as a pattern of
similar and serious errors
which confirm that the sonographers are
not thoroughly checking
all elements of the baby's development
this whistleblower has worked as a
sonographer in a number of branches
alongside her job in the nhs
there's so many women it's like a
conveyor belt there's been near misses
already
she claims working conditions mean
problems will be missed
they want to be all singing all dancing
medical checks pictures
and it can't be done in a five to eight
minute scan and it can't be done
effectively when you've already done
30. you would never do a medical scan in
the nhs with all those distractions
going on
it's really important that sonographer
is able to concentrate and not have
somebody trying to sell the customer
a teddy bear pregnancy can be a really
anxious time for many women
what's wrong if they need that extra
reassurance there's nothing wrong with
extra reassurance but what i'm finding
is they're wanting it earlier and
earlier
you know they offer scans from six weeks
where it's a bit hit and miss if you can
actually see anything that you can
relate to
so then it's back for another scan and
then maybe another and then a gender
scan
the company says it conducts more than a
hundred thousand scans a year in human
error
can occur it said 15 minute appointments
are the same length used by some nhs
trusts and aren't full anomaly scans
we wanted to see what people made of
their service
many positive reviews are left online
what an incredible stunning place
but we found the owner of multiple
branches using their own facebook
account to praise studios
[Music]
this is the standard for ultrasound
clinics to aspire to five stars
thank you so much for your amazing
review mark
we've also discovered one of the
company's directors posting a review
saying really impressed how the clinic
is keeping everyone
safe during the coronavirus outbreak the
same image is used on his facebook
profile
we asked window to the womb why managers
hadn't disclosed their connection to the
company
it said it recognized that a handful of
these reviews do not link with
appointments
and plan to remove them immediately
we showed our evidence to an expert in
ultrasound
telling somebody to leave without
telling them something wrong is
it's appalling really jacqueline
torrington has over 20 years experience
scanning
it was my fallopian tubes had ruptured
and my stomach had filled with blood i
was arsed from death
lady with the ectopic that is horrifying
i mean that is
is so dangerous that
nothing about this report actually adds
up
beta's absent and
normal life
it's pregnancy contradictory it's a very
striking catalogue of
incredibly poor practice it ranges from
incredibly dangerous to anxiety inducing
and
all of it is
wrong
[Music]
the care quality commission is
responsible for regulating the services
companies provide
but we found branches that haven't been
inspected since opening four years ago
and learned it doesn't review samples of
scans as part of inspections
in a statement it says there is good
quality care in the industry as a whole
but it has a growing concern the
government says the majority of
stenographers
are qualified nurses or radiographers
but experts in interpreting imagery say
regulation of sonographers
is needed you're doing the most
difficult scans at the trickiest time
for for the most anxious group of people
on a workforce that
you don't necessarily know their their
level of skills
their level of expertise and what
training they've actually had
many staff at these companies working as
radiographers and midwives
will be regulated so why does any of
this matter
it matters now because of the massive
increase in these companies if you said
to most members of the public
do you realize that some of the people
scanning you actually
don't have an easy way of demonstrating
that expertise
i think the mums would be surprised
problems in pregnancy are rare but women
who've experienced them say it's vital
private scans don't lead to false
reassurance
it has put an effect on mine in my
husband's relationship because it's
something that
i don't know could it happen again would
it happen again and
could i trust anybody's judgment that
it's not gonna
you know it was just so close and it's
one of them things that
thank god i come with the other side but
how wrong could this go for somebody
else
you