Stillbirths and Infant Health Risks Higher in California’s Artificially Conceived Infants
by Miriam Zoll
Image by TipsTimesAdmin via Flickr
A new study published in the Journal of Perinatology online has found that in California from 2009-2011 there was a 24- to 27-fold increase in multiple births and significantly higher rates of preterm births, lower birth weights, fetal anomalies and stillbirth among infants born through assisted reproductive technologies (ART) or artificial insemination (AI) compared to babies conceived naturally.
The retrospective study was based on 2009-2011 data from the California Office of Statewide Health Planning and Development and conducted by researchers from the Loma Linda Univ...
Source: Our Bodies Our Blog - February 28, 2014 Category: Health Medicine and Bioethics Commentators Authors: Guest Blogger Tags: Public Policy Reproductive Technology & Genetic Engineering Source Type: blogs
Crosspost: Studying - not wantonly killing - the microbes around us and the rise of the "microbiology of the built environment"
Image by Thomas Fuchs - from article about the work of the BioBE Center in Scientific American "What's in Your Bacterial Aura?" by Peter Andrey SmithNote - Crosspost from microBEnet. Imagine you have a camera with a special "anti-macro" lens. This lens scrubs from any image all plants and animals and other "macro" organisms. And this lens also highlights the remaining living things - the microorganisms - anywhere in the frame (including those that were in or on the macro organisms removed from the image). Maybe you get a pixel or two of some color depending on what microbes are there. If ...
Source: The Tree of Life - February 20, 2014 Category: Medical Scientists Authors: Jonathan Eisen Source Type: blogs
2 Years & 3 Days
This is my now 2 year old..hard to believe it's been that long! It was a rough first couple of weeks for him. After the 3 am c-section, they monitored him with me for the first couple hours & when his blood glucose started dropping, gave him formula. That didn't work so they placed an IV & gave him Dextrose. That worked, but then his temperature started dropping so they placed him on antibiotics until cultures came back negative for infection. (That took a couple days) Cultures came back,they took him off the antibiotics and then his bilirubin levels started to rise (getting into the moderate range) so they treate...
Source: The D-Log Cabin - January 11, 2014 Category: Diabetes Authors: HVS Source Type: blogs
Our IVF success story - a test of determination, love and professional support
It was the 3rd year of our marriage -2011. We lost our first baby girl at full term due to meconium aspiration. Just 2 days before this fatal day I had lost my mother to another doctors’ negligence. As a precaution, I had insisted our ob-gynaecologist on the next day of my moms’ death to perform C-section on my wife and then I could also break the news to my wife. She ignored my request despite my in-laws visiting her on the same day with my request to her clinic. All along she kept telling us that it was a precious pregnancy , a successful IUI outcome after diagnosis of mild endometriosis. A well planned c-section was...
Source: The Patient's Doctor - December 25, 2013 Category: Obstetricians and Gynecologists Source Type: blogs
Bipolar, Pregnant & Visiting the UK? They May Take Your Unborn Baby
Yesterday I brought you the unfortunate story of a Canadian turned away from our borders not because she was a terrorist or criminal — but because she simply had a diagnosis of depression and, more than a year ago, was hospitalized for treatment of it.
Just to show you that the United States isn’t the only backwards country in the world when it comes to discriminating against those with a mental illness, I bring you the much sadder story of an Italian woman who had bipolar disorder, went to the UK for a training course, and wound up being forced to have a C-section without her consent. Wait, what?
Worse, this ...
Source: World of Psychology - December 4, 2013 Category: Psychiatrists and Psychologists Authors: John M. Grohol, Psy.D. Tags: Bipolar Disorders General Policy and Advocacy Women's Issues Bipolar Disorder Britain Canada Italy Mental Disorder Pregnancy Psychiatry Relapse Ryanair Social Services Suicide United Kingdom Source Type: blogs
Healthcare Update Satellite — 12-04-2013
What are the busiest hospital emergency departments? An American Hospital Association survey from 2011 published earlier this year is surprising (link to .pdf file). The 25 busiest hospitals in the US see more than 5 million patients per year. Florida Hospital in Orlando is the busiest in the US and sees 407,000 patients per year – an average of 1,100 per day.
Georgia Supreme Court rules that emergency physician’s to diagnose a pulmonary embolism in 15 year old football player who had arthroscopic knee surgery a week prior to ED visit can constitute gross negligence. The patient had pleuritic chest pain, a norm...
Source: WhiteCoat's Call Room - December 4, 2013 Category: Emergency Medicine Doctors Authors: WhiteCoat Tags: Healthcare Update Source Type: blogs
Our most awaited gift has arrived!
So after our long wait – fertility treatment for 2 years and journey through pregnancy, our bundle of joy arrived earlier this month! Our earlier update (given below) was at the beginning of my second trimester. Everything was going as smooth as one could pray for. But towards the end of second trimester I failed the glucose tolerance test for Gestational Diabetes and with my numbers, history and precious pregnancy I was asked to start insulin immediately. The pricks for testing sugar levels and insulin shots were no joy - but we had no choice but go by the doctor’s advice. Though this bothered us for a while, things f...
Source: The Patient's Doctor - December 2, 2013 Category: Obstetricians and Gynecologists Source Type: blogs
Weekly Roundup – November 21, 2013
Happy almost Friday! Obamacare continues to get top billing in health care news. Below are some of the non-Obamacare health care stories that we hope you will find interesting.
The medical profession has issued new guidelines for fighting the nation’s obesity epidemic. These guidelines recommend physicians be more aggressive about helping their patients lose unneeded pounds. The Washington Post has more on what this might mean for you at your next doctor’s appointment.
The New York Times published an article about Jorge Odón, a car mechanic who developed a tool that eases births. The device whose idea came from a YouT...
Source: Disruptive Women in Health Care - November 21, 2013 Category: Health Medicine and Bioethics Commentators Authors: dw at disruptivewomen.net Tags: Roundup American Academy of Pediatrics health new york times USA Today Wall Street Journal Washington Post Source Type: blogs
Odon Device Helps Pop Babies Like a Cork
In modern hospitals, during child birth if the baby’s head is having trouble coming out, tools are often used, and C-section is always a stand-by option. In many places sufficient facilities simply don’t exist and cheap solutions to helping with delivery are always welcome. Jorge Odón, an Argentine car mechanic, may be an unlikely inventor for a birth assistance device, but after watching a video of how to remove a cork that was pushed into a bottle, he realized that the same technique could be applied to newborns’ heads. Talk about translational medicine!
The Odon Device is inserted so that the bag gra...
Source: Medgadget - November 18, 2013 Category: Technology Consultants Authors: Editors Tags: Ob/Gyn Source Type: blogs
The LITFL Review 115
The LITFL Review is your regular and reliable source for the highest highlights, sneakiest sneak peaks and loudest shout-outs from the webbed world of emergency medicine and critical care. Each week the LITFL team casts the spotlight on the best and brightest from the blogosphere, the podcast video/audiosphere and the rest of the Web 2.0 social media jungle to find the most fantastic EM/CC FOAM (Free Open Access Meducation) around.
Welcome to the 114th edition, brought to you by:
Kane Guthrie [KG] from LITFL
Tessa Davis [TRD] from LITFL and Don’t Forget The Bubbles
Brent Thoma [BT] from BoringEM, and
Chris Nickson [C...
Source: Life in the Fast Lane - November 11, 2013 Category: Emergency Medicine Doctors Authors: Kane Guthrie Tags: Education eLearning Emergency Medicine Featured Intensive Care LITFL review LITFL R/V Source Type: blogs
How hospitals waste the patient's money
One of the ways private for-profit hospitals
boost their profits is by insisting that patients have to repeat all their
medical tests once again after they have been admitted. Thus, it's not uncommon
to see patients who have had a MRI scan at a reputed imaging center being
forced to repeat the scan once they have been hospitalized. “ Hospital policy “
dictates that before surgery can be performed, an MRI scan needs to be done in
the hospital’s own MRI department – and that the surgeon cannot do the
operation without doing this.
This makes absolutely no sense for the
patient who has already done all the tests his...
Source: The Patient's Doctor - October 18, 2013 Category: Obstetricians and Gynecologists Source Type: blogs
Why You Should Let Your Baby Be Frustrated
As a new mom and a recent MSW graduate, I can’t help but analyze, question, and sometimes fear the ways in which my parenting choices will affect my son.
During the few months I was home with my baby, I joined a moms group. Now that the babies are three or four months old, the conversations sound like “my baby will not sleep in the crib,” “my baby wakes up every three hours,” “my baby needs to be held all day.”
From a recommendation, I read Bringing Up Bébé: One American Mother Discovers the Wisdom of French Parenting when I was pregnant. The 2012 book is written by Pamela Druckerman, an American mom raisi...
Source: World of Psychology - October 6, 2013 Category: Psychiatrists and Psychologists Authors: Jill Ceder, MSW, JD Tags: Books Caregivers Children and Teens Family General Mental Health and Wellness Parenting Psychology anxiety baby Caroline Thompson French language French people Frustrated Infant Michel Cohen Mother Pamela Druckerman Sle Source Type: blogs
Medical Mispronunciations and Misspelled Words: The Definitive List.
Hearing medical mispronunciations and seeing misspelled words are an under appreciated joy of working in healthcare. Physicians often forget just how alien the language of medicine is to people who don't live it everyday. The best part about being a physician is not helping people recover from critical illness. The best part is not about listening and understanding with compassion and empathy. Nope, the best part about being a physician is hearing patients and other healthcare providers butcher the language of medicine and experiencing great entertainment in the process. Doctors c...
Source: The Happy Hospitalist - October 2, 2013 Category: Internists and Doctors of Medicine Authors: Tamer Mahrous Source Type: blogs
Gestational Diabetes: More Treatment Approaches
By Amy Campbell
If you've been reading about gestational diabetes over the past couple of weeks, you might be thinking that it seems like an awful lot of work to manage it. You're right, it is. Remember that gestational diabetes is diabetes that occurs during pregnancy. If you already have diabetes, then you know the amount of effort it takes to try and control it. One of the positive aspects about gestational diabetes (GDM) is that it pretty much disappears after the baby is born. And of course, nothing tops the reward and joy of a happy, healthy baby!
Last week I wrote about the ways in which GDM is managed. Not surprisi...
Source: Diabetes Self-Management - September 23, 2013 Category: Diabetes Authors: Amy Campbell Source Type: blogs
Gestational Diabetes: What Are the Risks?
By Amy Campbell
People are often taught that there are three types of diabetes: Type 1, Type 2, and gestational. In reality, there are actually many more types, but the simplified explanation is that if you have diabetes, you likely have one of these three.
What is gestational diabetes?
The American Diabetes Association defines gestational diabetes as "diabetes diagnosed during pregnancy that is not clearly overt diabetes." Like pregnancy, gestational diabetes (GDM) is temporary. GDM will resolve in about 90% of women after they've given birth. It's important, though, to distinguish GDM from women with preexisting diabete...
Source: Diabetes Self-Management - September 9, 2013 Category: Diabetes Authors: Amy Campbell Source Type: blogs
