News and Features Related to Health & Baby

1. Pregnancy: High-Normal Blood Sugar Risky
   

   May 7, 2008 -- Babies born to women with even slightly higher-than-normal blood sugar levels are at increased risk for a range of pregnancy and delivery-related complications, findings from an international study confirm. The large study examined the risks associated with having elevated blood sugar

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2. Group: Few Reasons to Use Soy Formula
   

   May 5, 2008 -- What's best to feed baby? According to the American Academy of Pediatrics, mother's breast milk still rules. However, the group finds that when the majority of infants in North America are 2 months old, they are getting at least some formula. The AAP has released its revised report on

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3. Antidepressants Linked to Preterm Birth
   

   May 5, 2008 (Washington) -- Taking antidepressants in pregnancy may raise the risk of giving birth prematurely, researchers report. But left untreated, depression may also increase the chance of preterm birth, says researcher Katherine Wisner, MD, professor of psychiatry, ob-gyn, and women's studies

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4. Cord Blood Stem Cells: Your Questions Answered
   

   Stem cells are immature cells that can transform into other kinds of cells and reproduce themselves. Cord blood stem cells are collected in the umbilical cord at birth and can produce all of the blood cells in the body. Cord blood stem cells can be used to treat blood-related diseases, such as leuke

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5. Brave New World
   

   By Colleen Dunn Bates Every newly pregnant woman embarks on an adventure as boldly as astronaut Sally Ride and as full of expectations as Christopher Columbus. Even if you’ve been pregnant before, each voyage is fraught with new fears and blessed with new surprises. To ease these fears and help prep

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6. Deciding Baby's Sex
   

   If you're yearning to conceive a baby boy, can it really be as easy as eating breakfast cereal and a potassium-rich diet to tip the scales toward blue booties, as a recent study seems to indicate? If you want to welcome a bundle of pink, can tweaking your diet in other ways boost the chances? The re

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7. Ominous Rise in Pre-Pregnancy Diabetes
   

   April 28, 2008 -- Diabetes before pregnancy -- linked to miscarriage and birth defects -- has doubled in six years. The finding comes from analysis of data on more than 175,000 pregnant women treated in Kaiser Permanente hospitals from 1999 through 2005. The researchers focused on the 2,784 births t

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8. Mom's Diet May Influence Her Baby's Sex
   

   April 22, 2008 -- In addition to being the most important meal of the day, breakfast may help determine your unborn baby's sex. In a newly reported study, women who ate breakfast cereal gave birth to more boys, while those who skipped breakfast had more girls. Women who ate more total calories also

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9. Memory Lapse? It May Be Pregnancy Brain
   

   When she was pregnant with her now 1 1/2-year-old son, Bena Blakeslee frantically paced an airport parking lot searching in vain for her Jeep. Exasperated after an hour of this fruitless endeavor, she broke down in tears and called her husband to tell him that their car had been stolen. Turns out th

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10. Weight, Sex Affect Early Preterm Survival
    

    April 16, 2008 -- For babies born extremely early, new research shows that four factors -- aside from the baby's gestational age -- may affect their odds of survival if given intensive care. The four factors are: Sex (survival is better for girls) Single birth or multiple birth (survival is better f

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