Two Major Birth Defects That Affect Infants

According to the CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) website, every 4.5 minutes, a baby is born with a birth defect in the United States. That means 120,000 babies are affected by birth defects each year. Many of these birth defects affect any part of the body including: brain, foot, heart, vision and many more. Many can affect the way you look, or the proper function of your body or both. Two major birth defects that affect infants are Omphalocele and Spina Bifida . Omphalocele is a type of hernia. This is when the liver and other abdominal organs stick out of the belly button (naval). According to the CDC, approximately 775 (1 out of every 5,386) babies are born with omphalocele each year in the U.S. Depending on how severe the hernia is, different procedures are taken. There are many forms of treatment to get rid of this hernia and to prevent any further complications. Spina Bifida is a condition that affects the spine and is usually visible at birth. It is a type of neural tube defect (NTD). Spina Bifida affects 4000 pregnancies each year in the U.S. which is an average of 11 pregnancies per day making it 1 out of every 1000 newborns in the U.S. born with this defect. These two medical conditions are major birth defects that affect a child each minute making it important to know how to treat it after knowing the infant is born with a defect. Before a infant is born, a birth defect can be found before birth, at birth or any time after birth. Many defects can be found within the first year and many are easy to see, but others are not (such as heart defects or hearing loss) are found by special tests, such as echocardiograms, x-rays or hearing test. Omphalocele can be seen during week six through ten of pregnancy, when getting a ultrasound. As the baby develops during this time, the intestines get longer and push out of the belly into the umbilical cord. During the following weeks of pregnancy, the intestines naturally go back into the