Standard practice in the delivery room states that babies are weighed immediately after birth. This practice is to check and analyze if the baby weighs less than its gestational weight. Normally full term babies should weigh more than 5 and half pounds. Obviously, there may be many reasons for babies having a low birth weight (i.e. small adult parents, etc). However, babies may have a low birth weight due to certain serious reasons such as the mother smoked during pregnancy, alcohol, drugs, poor nutrition, disease, birth defects and other behaviors or conditions. Without a quick and accurate diagnosis of problems within a newborn, lifelong health problems could be in store for the infant. Studies have shown that babies born with a low birth weight usually have long term health problems.
Several factors may raise the possibilities of developing osteoporosis. Here are a few major factors:
Sex. This may sound like God’s bias, but the truth is- your being male or female has a lot to do with osteoporosis risks. Compared to average men, women are twice as much vulnerable to osteoporosis fractures. According to medical science, this is because women have lesser bone mass and usually live longer compared to men. Abrupt decrease of estrogen (that remains at menopause) is another factor accelerating women’s bone decay.
Age. Osteoporosis related risks tend to rise with age. This is because bones in human body get weaker with age.
Race. May sound odd again, but a study found that people with Southeast Asian origin are most vulnerable to osteoporosis risks. Compared to that, Black and Hispanic males or females are less exposed to osteoporosis hazards.
Family tree. Osteoporosis can run through families. So, you might be at higher risks when your parents or near blood connections have osteoporosis. This applies especially when your family has a legacy of fractures.
Body frame. Osteoporosis is a thing to worry for males or females with unusually thin bone structures or body frames. Technically speaking they are more prone to osteoporosis as they have lesser bone mass than usual. This gets worse as they age.
Oral contraceptives or birth control pills are used by millions of women worldwide as a safe and effective way to prevent pregnancy. There are many oral contraceptives on the market, each of them marketed as the best and the safest, so it can become a little confusing.
To help select the best birth control pills, you need to understand what they are and how birth control pills actually work.
Generally speaking, birth control pills are small tablets that you need to swallow daily. As a norm, these pills contain the female hormones progestin and estrogen. These are the female hormones that are naturally produced by a woman’s ovaries. However, the pills contain hormones that are artificially manufactured in a laboratory. This is where some complications begin to occur. In a woman’s body, estrogen levels rise and help in the making of the uterus lining thick and in readiness for a fertilized egg. When the estrogen level peaks, an egg is then released. After the egg is released, progestin, another female hormone, begins to rise up and prepare the body to receive the fertilized egg. If conception fails to happen, the levels of these hormones drop and menstruation happens.
The Human Papilloma Virus or HPV is normally categorized by low- or high-risk, depending on the threat that it poses. The high-risk HPV is predominant in women and can lead to malignant cervical cancer. The high risk HPV is usually the outcome of high sexual activity involving multiple sex partners.
High-risk HPV can be the cause of genital warts that can lead to cervical cancer. The risk factor for cervical cancer is defined when the infection is a persistent high-risk HPV, that is, an infection that does not go away easily. Low-risk HPV may also cause genital warts, but it generally does not cause the cell changes that can lead to cervical cancer. Nevertheless, both categories will cause warts that are abnormal cellular changes in various parts of the body and will be categorized as small, benign and visible tumors.
Depending on the individual’s immune system, there is every possibility that a body’s strong defense system may prove a hurdle for the high-risk HPV. For the infected person, the early stage of high-risk HPV does indicate some precancerous cell changes in the cervix area known as ‘cervical dysplacia’, which are visible spots. If ignored or left untreated for a long time, they could turn out to be cells of the malignant kind.
Having high-risk HPV should not be automatically associated with having cervical cancer. In most cases, even the high-risk HPV types cause no health problems and go away on their own. In the long run, it is important for women not to ignore the signs and symptoms. With regular pap tests, the cervical cell changes can be easily detected and preventive treatment can be administered to prevent further development.
The low-risk and high-risk HPV are rarely associated with malignant lesions. Both types are known to cause abnormal cell changes on the cutaneous or mucosal membranes in the form of warts, and tend to grow on different parts of the body. The size of warts may vary, and most may not even be visible to the naked eye. Unfortunately, most HPV infected people are not aware for some time that they are the carriers of this virus.
There are three popular types of birth control pills:
1. The Mini Pill or progestin pill (POP). This pill contains no estrogen. It is used by breastfeeding mothers since estrogen hampers milk production. This works by thickening cervical mucus trapping the sperm and stopping it from entering the uterus. It should be taken once a day.
Some of the positive behaviors of using this pill are:
• Reduces blood loss during menstruation
• Reduces discomfort of menstrual cramps
• Can be used during breast feeding
• A safer choice for women over 30 years in age and who smoke
Some of the negative behaviors of using this pill are:
• Side effects like irregular or heavy bleeding, abdominal pain and headaches
• Must be taken regularly at the same time each day
• Is not useful against STD
• Not as efficient as combination pills
The Relationship between Uterine Fibroids and Breasts Uterine fibroids are simply overgrowths of cells on the uterine wall. Fibrocystic breasts are breasts that develop lumpy, thick nodules. While both of these conditions hit women primarily in their pre-menopausal years, they are not related in the sense that one causes the other. Just because you might get one of them does not mean you will get the other one.
Both conditions are associated, at times, with an overabundance of estrogen and/or progesterone because both usually strike in the “high-estrogen” years of a woman’s life. These are usually the years preceding the onset of menopause. The uterus and the breasts both share common hormones because the hormones which prepare the breasts to secrete milk (during pregnancy) are the same as the ones that promote cell growth in the uterus. However, the two conditions, fibroids and fibrocystic breasts, have not been found to be related.
Fibroid Tumors
Fibroids are present in a large percentage of women and range in size from tiny (pinpoint) to huge (as big as a full-term pregnancy). Most women do not have any major symptoms with small fibroids but, if they should grow large, they can cause a number of problems, such as heavy menstrual periods, back pain, cramps, and bladder pressure. Fibroids start shrinking after menopause but if they grow large enough to cause problems, they are usually removed by having either a surgical hysterectomy or myomectomy. Hysterectomies involve removing the uterus while myomectomies take just the fibroid tumor itself.
Fibroids are cellular growths on the wall of the uterus. They are almost always non-cancerous and are very common. The majority of women will get some form of fibroids during their lives and most of them will have no problems as a result. Some uterine fibroids are tiny and cause no trouble. Some, however, grow to be very large and cause a lot of problems.
Causes of fibroids
The precise cause of fibroids is unknown, although there are many theories. What is known is that both estrogen and progesterone must be present in order for fibroids to grow. Once a woman reaches menopause, fibroids will no longer be able to grow and cause problems.
Symptoms of fibroids
Many women never have any of the symptoms of fibroids. The ones who do experience symptoms often have large fibroids. Some of the most commonly experienced symptoms are heavy menstrual bleeding, painful stomach, uterine, and back cramps, urinary difficulties, and bladder pressure. Anemia is very often a result of the heavy menstrual periods caused by some fibroids.
Hormone Replacement Therapy (HRT) is most often used for women undergoing menopause, either natural or surgical-induced. It is used to improve the symptoms associated with menopause, such as hot flashes, mood swings, dry vagina, and urinary problems.
Women undergoing menopause experience these symptoms due to the lack of estrogen and/or progesterone. Women who have had hysterectomies usually take estrogen while women who still have their uterus need to take a combination of estrogen and progesterone.
Research
HRT was widely used until 2002, when research indicated that it could be harmful and cause women to be at higher risk of certain diseases, such as heart attack, stroke, and breast cancer. Most of the research, however, was done on women in their 60’s instead of in their 40’s and 50’s. It is thought that the younger groups of women are at lower risk of getting these diseases than the older group. On a brighter note, however, women’s risk levels for the other diseases go back down once they have been off of HRT for 4 to 5 years.
Fibroid tumors are non-cancerous cell overgrowths of the uterus. They can form on the inside, outside, or wall of the uterus and can be as small as a pinpoint or as large as a well-developed pregnancy. Fibroids occur during a woman’s childbearing years but once menopause starts, they often diminish in size.
What makes fibroids grow?
Both estrogen and progesterone must be present in order for fibroid tumors to grow in size. Once women enter menopause, they stop making estrogen and progesterone, which is why fibroids become less of a problem at that time.
Birth control pills are thought to play a role in the growth of fibroid tumors, though not the actual cause of them. It appears that the tumors grow when birth control pills are present in the system and slow down or stop if the pills are discontinued.
Hormone Replacement Therapy (HRT) is a form of treatment that is used to treat women who have severe menopause symptoms. It was once a highly favored treatment for other diseases, such as osteoporosis and heart disease, but has been abandoned for those causes since recent research revealed that using it posed significant health risks. It is still used to treat menopausal symptoms in some women, although many doctors and patients have backed off of using it as much as they once did.
Hormone replacement therapy involves using synthetic hormones to replace the hormones that menopausal women are no longer able to make on their own. Women who still have their ovaries and uterus usually need a combination of estrogen and progesterone but women who have undergone hysterectomy just need estrogen. Using HRT usually helps the bothersome symptoms of menopause, especially if the symptoms are severe.
In addition to prescribing HRT for menopausal women, physicians once prescribed Hormone Replacement Therapy for osteoporosis and heart conditions. A few years ago, HRT was being hailed as an effective and safe anti-aging treatment. However, after the results of research pertaining to its long-term effects, HRT is usually no longer used for anything other than severe menopause symptoms.
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