The placenta carries oxygen and nutrition to the fetus and is also responsible for removing waste products from the baby. The placenta does not act as a filter as we commonly think of filters (such as coffee filters or air filters), holding onto toxins over the course of the pregnancy. It passes waste products […]
Research
Seattle doctor is one step closer to discovering the cause of SIDS
Daniel Rubens, an anesthesiologist at Seattle Children’s Hospital may be one step closer to discovering the cause of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS). The syndrome, causing seemingly healthy babies to mysteriously die in their sleep, has 4,000 victims in the US annually. Dr. Rubens has a hypothesis that babies who become victims of SIDS […]
Could Copper Prevent Infections In Hospital Patients?
It is estimated that 1 in 25 hospital patients acquire an infection that was unrelated to the illness the were initially hospitalized for. In the US, it costs approximately $40 billion per year to treat patients who became infected during their hospital stay. As you can imagine there are many ramifications to these healthcare-acquired […]
Common drug given after birth linked to poor breastfeeding outcomes
A drug commonly given to women to speed up the delivery of the placenta is now being blamed for poor breastfeeding rates in the UK. The drug known as ergotmetrine has been determined to disrupt the body’s response to the birth hormone oxytocin and prolactin, a hormone responsible for milk production in mothers. While […]
Do baby boys lead to more weight gain in pregnancy?
An analysis of 68 million births over 23 years has found a link between maternal weight gain and boy fetuses. “Over all, 51 percent of babies born are boys. But Kristen J. Navara, an endocrinologist in the Poultry Science Department at the University of Georgia, found that the amount of pregnancy weight gained and […]
A mother’s mouth impacts the placenta’s bacteria
It has long been thought that the mothers’ womb is a sterile environment. However, new findings are showing that a baby is first exposed to microbes in utero. The bacteria of a placenta is similar to that of the mother’s mouth, which is thought to be passed to the baby from foods consumed by the […]
