Tuesday, March 17, 2009

Antenatal care is essential to the fetus' health.

Do you know that antenatal care can minimize premature birth? Abnormality in the brain can occur at antenatal stage due to poor antenatal care or the health of the pregnant mother. Since a healthy brain and body, to a great extent, determine the future of your child, prenatal as well as pregnancy stage care is of great importance.

When my wife went into hospital for Cushing Syndrome, she was asked what medicine she was taking. When the doctor was told that she was not taking any other medicine except that given by the hospital, they asked a number of times whether she was taking any over the counter tonic or medicine. They suspected that whatever tonic or medicine which she had taken must have contained steroids. However, she did not. Doctors at the hospital did explain that most cases of Cushing Syndrome result from taking medicine containing steroids. Sometimes, taking such medicine is unavoidable in order to cure another sickness. In such a case, Cushing Syndrome is a side effect.

Medicine and its side effect can cause us serious sickness. Imagine what can possibly happen should our unborn child were to consume such medicine through the mother. After all, at this time, all fetuses get their nutrition from the mother. And, whatever medicine or chemicals in the bloodstream of the mother goes to the fetus as well.

What are the possible problems that come with abnormality of the development of the brain? We have cerebral palsy, dyslexia and dyscalculia.

According to medical science, cerebral palsy which impairs the flow of messages from the brain to the muscles, is an injury to the fetus’ brain during late pregnancy or the first two years of a child’s life.

Dyslexia is a learning disorder due to difficulties in recognizing and understanding written language. This is not due to low intelligence or brain damage. It is believed to be due to an abnormality of the brain. According to medical science research, reading therapy has been able to stimulate and correct the brain.
Similar to dyslexia is a mental disability known as dyscalculia which has to do with poor ability at figures in arithmetic.

However, should such problems arise, parents should not play the blame game but take positive immediate action to consult the relevant specialists to help their children overcome them and lead a normal life.

2 comments:

  1. Great post. Well explained. Many people take antenatal care for granted. Antenatal Care is important. The aim if it is to achieve healthy mother and child. Antenatal visits helps to confirm normal pregnancy, detect the exact date of conception for women. It helps to monitor iron content, blood sugar, HIV presence, any other sexually transmitted disease. To know more on Antenatal care, refer Antenatal care

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thanks for the comments. So, to all parents or parents-to-be, here's another link to go to for further knowledge.

    ReplyDelete