Risk factors in pregnancy

Thanks to scientific research we know that certain substances or circumstances may cause alterations of embryonic development, resulting in birth defects in the future baby.

The agents that can alter the development of the embryo and fetus are considered risk factors. But to understand the meaning of the term "risk" is not simple. In fact, it is relatively common that some people deem as an overstatement considering the substances or adverse circumstances for the baby.
Even trying to document the overstatement with comments (which are very harmful) as: "I know a woman who, 42 years old, has had a healthy boy and beautiful" or "A friend had rubella during pregnancy and had a healthy child ".

The advanced maternal age and suffered rubella during pregnancy are important risk factors, which does not mean that all women who suffer from mature or rubella during pregnancy are to have a baby with abnormalities.

No agent, a side that is, causes birth defects in all the children of all women exposed to it.
What we mean when we talk about risk factor is that among pregnant women who come into contact with any of those factors will have a larger proportion (which is different for each factor) of children with birth defects among the group Women who were not in touch with these actors.

Statistics
For example, according to some statistics, the frequency of children with Down syndrome among mothers under 35 years is 0.72 per thousand boys born, while among women over 35 years is 7.54 per thousand. That is, they have ten times more risk of having children with Down syndrome than the younger ones.

When we say that the maternal age is a risk factor, we are not ensuring that all women over 35 years will have children with Down syndrome. The same applies to infections during pregnancy, alcohol, to snuff, contact with animals ... The problem is that we can not know who is going to affect a particular agent and who is not.

Down syndrome - a boy with DS in the family

Sometimes, and soon after the official statement of existing Down syndrome in the baby, the petty one not and waited by your parents with the happiness that are usually generated. This is, a group of symptoms and diverse signs are manifested in the person's global development from your approach, because of the genetic excess material of the chromosome 21. Then cry, anguishes, pain, deception, rejection and negation; they are some of the emotional probable manifestations when the dad and the mom find out this fact.

For these reasons, world campaigns of qualification have begun for obstetricians, midwives, efermeras and neonatólogas with the purpose of that when a baby is born with Down syndrome, know how to react and don't transform that session into a day of mourning. The family needs to know that the boy maybe is a little more dilatory than the other children that will have to lavish you a little more than carefulness, but that you will surely be able to swim, to read, to write, to sing, to run, to play, to draw, to grow, to dream and to love as your siblings, to your rhythm.

One of each 650 babies that are born suffers Down syndrome, and your 50% he/she can have a congenital cardiopathy that should be diagnosed on time, as well as you suit to prevent immunologic possible disorders and aletraciones endocrinológicas. This information helps to the family so that you understand and you accompany your increment well. Every day you are more people with Down syndrome integrated in preschools and common schools, and in works that were impossible until yesterday for them.

To accept that the son that were born has not been the prospective one, you require time, you fight and patience. The increment and development of each person's potential depends exclusively and from the start, of your parents. and you know that you will have limitations but nobody can predict them with surety. Amid this fight that most of the families undertake with estocismo, a malignant virus is sometimes strained almost imperceptibly: that of the discrimination. When some people are affected by this virus, they usually call to these boys with the current "mongólicos" term; they usually believe that one cannot make anything for them; that are inferior" "beings. And you are another discrimination, more subtle, less aggressive, that sometimes leave of the boy's same parents. You are mammas that you/they say: "my son is a down", when in fact your son is a boy that Down syndrome possesses. Neither it is convenient to use words like you "suffer of ", you "have a cruel destination", you are "diseased of", because you are not an illness and because the issue of the destination nobody tastes it like certain science. Neither it is not certain that all those that have Down syndrome are same to each other: each one of them resembles the other members of your family, although you are certain that they have some physical features characteristic of the syndrome.

You are also dads and moms that feel a lot of blame because internally recjhazan to that son, although they take care of it and they attend with all that he needs. In that case it is important that they can request help. We usually hide generally what are happening us. You give us shame, you give us pain... and you are for that reason that to the margin of that make with our son, you are important to be advised professionally with experts in family, to be able to habloar of the topic and to learn what to make. The siblings can also feel guilty for not accepting to the recently arrived as them they wanted; and instead of denying it, this is to speak to it in an appropriate frame.

Not there is any test that to have a son with Down syndrome has algú negative important or permanent effect in the legal capacity of the other children. In fact, if you wonder to the biggest siblings how they feel in connection with it, your answers suggest that rather there is a beneficial effect. The siblings of the children with Down syndrome, they are usually very tolerant, with a grade of very remarkable understanding and a great maturity in your treatment with the other ones.