Small For Gestational Age : Issues in 2008

My Solitude Of Space
There is a solitude of space. A solitude of sea. A solitude of death, but these Society shall be, Compared with that profounder site, That polar privacy. A soul admitted to itself- Finite infinity.

Saturday, 23 August 2008
Small For Gestational Age : Issues in 2008

Small for gestational age (SGA) infants account for about 10% of all live births. While the majority of these children show catch-up growth by 2 years of age, approximately 15% do not and continue to experience poor growth throughout childhood.

The major cause of morbidity and mortality in infancy and childhood is low birth weight. Additionally, children born SGA show an increased mortality from a wide range of disorders, including coronary artery disease and stroke later in life.

Children born SGA have also been shown to have a lower cognitive ability in mathematics and in reading comprehension. Those children who do not experience catch-up growth in height or head circumference exhibit the worst outcome.

First of all, why is size at birth important? I have three reasons here. To start off life, size at birth is predictive for perinatal mortality and morbidity. This graph shows one of the earliest studies to show this relationship between birth weight, lower birth weight, and increased mortality. While, of course, the absolute mortality rates are much lower these days, the same associations with birth weights are also seen.


Slide 5.
Secondly, at the end of childhood, low birth weight is important for adult height, and particularly, low-birth-weight children who do not catch up within the first few years of life remain small as adults. This is clearly exemplified by the control groups of recent, very long-term published results of growth hormone trials. Here you can see the control group does not show any spontaneous catch-up at all from early childhood through to adult life.


Slide 6.
In the next talk, you will hear much more about the association between low birth weight and increased risk of adult diseases, such as coronary heart disease and type 2 diabetes.

The Human Reproductive Clock Male genetic biological clock

When parents are over 35 years old, man and woman alike,
the following cases become prevalent:

Up to a third of all cases of schizophrenia are linked to increasing paternal age.
Men 40 and older are nearly six times more likely to have offspring with autism than men under age 30.
Other research shows that the risk of breast and prostate cancer in offspring increases with paternal age.
The chances of parents of babies with achondroplasia is higher
Older fathers can cause genetic conditions in their offspring, such as birth defects, autism and schizophrenia.
Increased chances of an older woman having a baby with Down's syndrome has been well documented.




Posted by Neriz at Thursday, August 21, 2008
Labels: pasalubong, science

A Very Thoughtful Post

Saturday, August 09, 2008

MY TWO UNCLES: THE MALE BIOLOGICAL CLOCK
"Moses was one hundred twenty years old when he died; his sight was unimpaired and his vigor had not abated"* (Deuteronomy 34:7).Women know that they have a biological clock. By the time they are in their 30's the bio ticking gets louder and louder. There is a lot of psychology connected with the feminine biological clock.But, is there a male biological clock? Yes, but what guy is checking the time? Guys assume that they will always make sperm so, what is the hurry? What is important for guys to know is that, from a fertility and health perspective, having children is for the young. The biological material is just better. After 35 deterioration is beginning to set in. Men 40 and over are nearly 6 times more likely to have offspring with autism than men younger than 30.** By age 60, 85% of sperm is clinically abnormal. Increased age in the father increases the risk of schizophrenia in the children.I have 2 uncles in my family history, one on my dad's side and one on my mother's side. Both of these uncles did not marry until they were 40 years old. One uncle fathered 4 children who grew up to be responsible, well-functioning adults. The other uncle fathered 3 children, 2 of them grew up to be good citizens, Christians and parents. The oldest child of the second uncle developed normally. He was a good student and was dedicated as a Christian too. During his college years he developed schizophrenia. This mental illness led to his tragic death and was the cause of a great deal of anguish for the family too.Would this have happened had my second uncle fathered children earlier in life? We cannot know for sure, but if there is a question about the timing of having children, put the odds in your favor and do it sooner rather than later.Grace&Peace,Tom*James Michener said in "The Source" that the verse meant that Moses was good in bed at 120 years old. I doubt that he took any supplements either, but then all his food was organic.**Statistics came from an article in "Psychology Today" called "A Man's Shelf Life," by Mark Teich. I had read similar statistics in other publications on this subject so it seemed like they were credible.
Posted by Tom at 8:05 PM