Lifestyle
Know as They Grow: How birth defects affect each stage of life
(Family Features) Birth defects, structural changes that affect one or more parts of the body, are the leading cause of infant mortality. A baby is born with a birth defect every 4.5 minutes, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control & Prevention (CDC).
Birth Defects
Birth defects most often develop during the first three months of pregnancy, when a baby’s organs are forming. Not only can they affect mortality, but they can also cause problems for a baby’s overall health and how the body develops and functions. Common birth defects include congenital heart defects, cleft lip, cleft palate and spina bifida.
Genetics, behaviors and social and environmental factors can impact the risk for birth defects, and not all birth defects can be prevented. To help improve the lives of people living with birth defects, consider this information from the experts at March of Dimes, who aim to provide knowledge about what birth defects are, how to prevent them and their impact across all stages of life.
Pregnancy
Although not all birth defects can be prevented, people can increase their chances of having a healthy baby by managing health conditions and adopting healthy behaviors before becoming pregnant.
When planning a pregnancy, see a health care professional and start prenatal care as soon as possible. Talk about taking any medications you’re currently taking (or might need during the pregnancy), including vitamins. Most doctors recommend women take 400 micrograms of folic acid every day before and during pregnancy to help prevent birth defects.
Also discuss vaccinations (including COVID-19, since pregnant women are at elevated risk for severe COVID-19 illness) and other medical concerns, such as how to manage diabetes. Avoid overheating and treat fevers and infections promptly. Avoid alcohol, smoking cigarettes and marijuana or other drugs during pregnancy.
Infancy
If your baby is diagnosed with a birth defect during pregnancy, or born with a birth defect or other health condition, he or she may need special care to aid growth and development. Many children with birth defects lead long and happy lives. However, birth defects remain critical conditions that can cause lifelong challenges.
Advancements such as improved newborn screening and early detection of birth defects can help pinpoint potential problems and ensure the baby begins receiving supportive care for better survival rates and quality of life. Examples include newborn screenings for critical congenital heart defects and monitoring bladder and kidney function in infants and children with spina bifida.
Childhood
Meeting the complex needs of a person with birth defects involves the whole family and can be challenging at times. Finding resources, knowing what to expect and planning for the future can help. Early intervention services and support include special education, speech therapy and physical therapy. These can have a significant impact on a child’s ability to learn new skills, overcome challenges and increase success in school and life.
Some babies born with birth defects may also have physical and intellectual disabilities. The exact ages of developmental milestones are different for each child. Families, educators and health care providers can work together to set meaningful goals and create a plan to help children living with birth defects reach their full potential.
Adolescence
Adolescents and young adults living with birth defects may face unique challenges as they transition from childhood to adulthood. They may need to navigate changes in insurance and transition from a familiar pediatric specialist to a new adult doctor. It’s important for people with birth defects and their families to begin planning for this transition during childhood so they can lead healthy, independent lives as adults.
Other areas of focus might include medications, surgeries and other procedures; mental health; social development and relationships within and outside the family; physical activity; and independence.
Adulthood
With every pregnancy, a woman starts out with a 3% chance of having a baby with a birth defect, regardless of underlying health conditions or lifestyle factors, according to the CDC.
Many women with birth defects and other health conditions have healthy, uneventful pregnancies. However, women with birth defects may be more likely to have a baby with a birth defect. People living with birth defects should talk with their health care providers before becoming pregnant about how a pregnancy might affect them and their baby.
Having someone in your family with a birth defect also increases your chances of having a baby with a birth defect. To learn more about your genetic risk of having a baby with a birth defect, talk with a clinical geneticist or a genetic counselor.
Learn more about birth defects by following #EveryJourneyMatters and #BirthDefects on social media and visiting marchofdimes.org/birthdefects.
Tips to Prevent Birth Defects
Not all birth defects can be prevented, but you can help reduce the risk and increase your chances of having a healthy baby by following these steps.
- Get a preconception checkup before you start trying to get pregnant.
- Ensure your vaccinations are up to date. Some vaccinations protect you from infections that can cause birth defects and updating certain vaccinations may mean you need to wait before trying to become pregnant.
- Take a vitamin supplement that includes 400 micrograms of folic acid every day.
- Learn about your family health history. If you, your partner, your children or someone in your families has a birth defect, you may want to see a genetic counselor to learn more about your risk.
- Work with your health care provider to manage chronic health conditions, such as diabetes.
- Talk to your health care provider about medicines you take, including any prescriptions, over-the-counter medicines, supplements and herbal products. Certain medicines may increase your baby’s risk of a birth defect.
- Reach a healthy weight. Being obese can increase your baby’s chances of having birth defects like neural tube defects, heart defects and cleft palate.
Photos courtesy of Shutterstock
SOURCE:
March of Dimes
Our Lifestyle section on STM Daily News is a hub of inspiration and practical information, offering a range of articles that touch on various aspects of daily life. From tips on family finances to guides for maintaining health and wellness, we strive to empower our readers with knowledge and resources to enhance their lifestyles. Whether you’re seeking outdoor activity ideas, fashion trends, or travel recommendations, our lifestyle section has got you covered. Visit us today at https://stmdailynews.com/category/lifestyle/ and embark on a journey of discovery and self-improvement.
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(Family Features) While most parents are good at keeping track of vaccines their kids need to stay healthy, many adults don’t realize there are immunizations important for keeping themselves heart-healthy, as well.
Adults, especially those with a history of heart disease or stroke, should take steps to stay up-to-date on preventive vaccines, particularly for the flu and COVID-19.
Influenza – While many experience just a few days of aches and chills, the flu can be deadly for some, including young children, the elderly and those with chronic conditions like heart disease, stroke and diabetes. There has also been research linking flu infection to cardiovascular disease (CVD). Getting a flu shot can not only prevent the flu, it may also reduce the risk of having a heart attack or stroke.
In fact, a study published in “Stroke” found that, among a group of people hospitalized for various reasons, those who experienced a flu-like illness within a month of their hospitalization were 38% more likely to have a stroke. Receiving the flu vaccine within a year prior to hospitalization lowered a person’s stroke risk to 11%.
“Getting an annual flu shot should be part of routine health care for all individuals, especially for people who are already living with chronic health conditions that put them at higher risk for heart attacks or strokes,” said Eduardo Sanchez, M.D., M.P.H., FAHA, American Heart Association chief medical officer for prevention. “The potentially serious complications of the flu are far greater for those with chronic diseases. This is true not just for older people but even those age 50 and younger who have a history of high blood pressure, heart disease or diabetes.”
COVID-19 – At the onset of the pandemic, the American Heart Association established the COVID-19 Cardiovascular Disease Registry, which found people with or at risk for CVD were more likely to become infected with and die from COVID-19. Additionally, the research found many people experience heart and vascular disease after getting COVID-19.
A study from the registry published in “Circulation: Arrhythmia and Electrophysiology” found new-onset atrial fibrillation in 1 in 20 patients hospitalized with COVID-19. Additionally, research also found people hospitalized with COVID-19 had a higher risk of stroke compared with people who had similar infectious conditions such as influenza or sepsis.
“We can’t stress enough the connections between COVID-19 and cardiovascular disease,” Sanchez said. “There is clear evidence that people who have heart and vascular disease and even those with CVD risk factors are more likely to get COVID and to have more severe complications from the virus.”
Other Immunizations – While flu and COVID-19 vaccines are of the utmost importance, there are a number of other immunizations that can help keep people heart-healthy.
- The pneumococcal vaccination protects against a common cause of severe pneumonia and is especially important for people 65 and older, and others with certain underlying medical conditions. This type of pneumonia can be deadly, especially for people already at high risk for health complications, including CVD. One shot is usually good for several years, although you may need a second one later depending on your age at your first shot.
- Shingles, a viral infection caused by the chickenpox virus, has been linked to an increased risk of stroke. More than 99% of people age 40 or older in the United States may carry the dormant chickenpox virus, also known as the varicella-zoster virus, and not even realize it.
Learn more about important immunizations and find other preventive health tips at heart.org.
Photo courtesy of Getty Images
SOURCE:
American Heart Association
Our Lifestyle section on STM Daily News is a hub of inspiration and practical information, offering a range of articles that touch on various aspects of daily life. From tips on family finances to guides for maintaining health and wellness, we strive to empower our readers with knowledge and resources to enhance their lifestyles. Whether you’re seeking outdoor activity ideas, fashion trends, or travel recommendations, our lifestyle section has got you covered. Visit us today at https://stmdailynews.com/category/lifestyle/ and embark on a journey of discovery and self-improvement.
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Lifestyle
Get chronic UTIs? Future treatments may add more bacteria to your bladder to beat back harmful microbes
Researchers developed a biomaterial releasing beneficial E. coli to combat urinary tract infections by outcompeting harmful bacteria, aiming to reduce antibiotic resistance and manage chronic UTIs effectively.
Sarguru Subash, Texas A&M University
Millions of people in the U.S. and around the world suffer from urinary tract infections every year. Some groups are especially prone to chronic UTIs, including women, older adults and some veterans.
These infections are typically treated with antibiotics, but overusing these drugs can make the microbes they target become resistant and reduce the medicines’ effectiveness.
To solve this problem of chronic UTIs and antibiotic resistance, we combined our expertise in microbiology and engineering to create a living material that houses a specific strain of beneficial E. coli. Our research shows that the “good” bacteria released from this biomaterial can compete with “bad” bacteria for nutrients and win, dramatically reducing the number of disease-causing microbes.
With further development, we believe this technique could help manage recurring UTIs that do not respond to antibiotics.
Bringing bacteria to the bladder
For the microbes living in people, nutrients are limited their presence varies between different parts of the body. Bacteria have to compete with other microbes and the host to acquire essential nutrients. By taking up available nutrients, beneficial bacteria can stop or slow the growth of harmful bacteria. When harmful bacteria are starved of important nutrients, they aren’t able to reach high enough numbers to cause disease.
Delivering beneficial bacteria to the bladder to prevent UTIs in challenging, though. For one, these helpful bacteria can naturally colonize only in people who are unable to fully empty their bladder, a condition called urinary retention. Even among these patients, how long these bacteria can colonize their bladders varies widely.
Current methods to deliver bacteria to the bladder are invasive and require repeated catheter insertion. Even when bacteria are successfully released into the bladder, urine will flush out these microbes because they cannot stick to the bladder wall.
Biomaterials to treat UTIs
Since beneficial bacteria cannot attach to and survive in the bladder for long, we developed a biomaterial that could slowly release bacteria in the bladder over time.
Our biomaterial is composed of living E. coli embedded in a matrix structure made of gel. It resembles a piece of jelly about 500 times smaller than a drop of water and can release bacteria for up to two weeks in the bladder. By delivering the bacteria via biomaterial, we overcome the need for the bacteria to attach to the bladder to persist in the organ.
We tested our biomaterial by placing it in human urine in petri dishes and exposing it to bacterial pathogens that cause UTIs. Our results showed that when mixed in a 50:50 ratio, the E. coli outcompeted the UTI-causing bacteria by increasing to around 85% of the total population. When we added more E. coli than UTI-causing bacteria, which is what we envision for future development and testing, the proportion of E. coli increased to over 99% of the population, essentially wiping out the UTI-causing bacteria. Moreoever, the biomaterial continued releasing E. coli for up to two weeks in human urine.
Our findings suggest that E.coli could stick around and survive in the bladder for extended periods of time and successfully decrease the growth of many types of bacteria that cause UTIs.
Improving biomaterials
Our findings show that E. coli can not only control harmful bacteria it’s closely related to but also a broad range of disease-causing bacteria in humans and animals. This means scientists might not need to identify different types of beneficial bacteria to control each pathogen – and there are many – that can cause a UTI.
Our team is currently evaluating how effectively our biomaterial can cure UTIs in mice. We are also working to identify the specific nutrients that beneficial and harmful bacteria compete over and what factors may help beneficial bacteria win. We could add these nutrients to our biomaterial to be released or withheld.
This research is still at an early stage, and clinical uses are not in development yet, so if it does reach patients it will be well in the future. We hope that our technology could be refined and applied to control other bacterial infections and some cancers caused by bacteria.
Sarguru Subash, Assistant Professor of Veterinary Pathobiology, Texas A&M University
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
Our Lifestyle section on STM Daily News is a hub of inspiration and practical information, offering a range of articles that touch on various aspects of daily life. From tips on family finances to guides for maintaining health and wellness, we strive to empower our readers with knowledge and resources to enhance their lifestyles. Whether you’re seeking outdoor activity ideas, fashion trends, or travel recommendations, our lifestyle section has got you covered. Visit us today at https://stmdailynews.com/category/lifestyle/ and embark on a journey of discovery and self-improvement.
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Lifestyle
Does Your Favorite Brand of Dark Chocolate Contain Dangerous Metals?
According to a recent article from Consumer Reports, there are some brands of Dark Chocolate that contain dangerous levels of lead, and cadmium.
Dark Chocolate
According to a recent article from Consumer Reports, there are some brands of Dark Chocolate that contain dangerous levels of lead, and cadmium.
Dark Chocolate has become popular due to studies suggesting that they are rich in antioxidants, which is beneficial to the heart, and it having low sugar properties that positively impact health.
The article, which was posted in mid December, states that 28 popular brands were tested, and that 23 of them contained high levels of the dangerous metals.
For more details, check out the article from Consumer Reports: https://www.consumerreports.org/health/food-safety/lead-and-cadmium-in-dark-chocolate-a8480295550/
STM Daily News is a vibrant news blog dedicated to sharing the brighter side of human experiences. Emphasizing positive, uplifting stories, the site focuses on delivering inspiring, informative, and well-researched content. With a commitment to accurate, fair, and responsible journalism, STM Daily News aims to foster a community of readers passionate about positive change and engaged in meaningful conversations. Join the movement and explore stories that celebrate the positive impacts shaping our world.
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