Hello and welcome, I understand your concern. There are two possibilities in your case. 1. the dates are not correct meaning the baby was conceived later than what is suggested by the last period. 2. the baby is small. This is rare at 17 weeks. The remedies for these are: If you have an early pregnancy ultrasound scan before 12 weeks, compare the gestation of this scan with the current one. Any doctor will help you with this, or if you post it in healthcaremagic, I will help you. If the gestation in the current ultrasound matches with that calculated from previous one, It is most likely wrong dates and there is no need to worry. If there is a lag in growth of the baby as compared to previous scan then there may be some problem. The causes for small for date babies are infections, improper maternal nutrition, diseases like heart disease and thyroid etc in mother, placental problems and genetic issue. So get an examination from your doctor to see if any of these are there. Most of the time no cause is found. As of now, the treatment for this is improve your nutrition by intake of 3-4 meals a day containing vegetables, fruits, cereals and meats in combination. drink plenty of water and avoid exposure to cigarette smoke. Sleep on left or right side to improve blood supply to the baby. Tablets like alamine forte and vitamins provide necessary nutrients to the baby and help in growth. Protein powders with milk and containing DHA are also helpful. Recheck by a repeat ultrasound after 2 weeks. If the baby grows by 2 weeks, then no worry, just continue the above regimen. Do not worry as stress will further decrease growth. Just stick to above treatment and you will be fine. Hope this satisfies your query. Thanks for using HCM. Feel free to ask any more questions that you may have. Dr Madhuri Bagde Consultant Obstetrician and Gynecologist