Success of Spina Bifida Study Opens Fetal Surgery Door

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/10/health/10fetal.html

Here is a story I found published in the NY times on Feb 09. It talks about surgery to repair spina bifida while the baby is still forming so that it give the baby a better chance at having less damaging effects like seen when the surgery's are performed after birth. It also talks about how many of the babies with spina bifida sometimes have water on the brain and pulling of their brainstem into the spinal column and that the outcomes were much better when surgery was done previous to birth. Sounds like the doctor who is doing this is very educated. I plan to have babies and I have spina bifida occulta, so it healed and wasnt severe thankfully but that puts my baby's at very high risk. If I were to get pregnant and was told my baby had any sign of severe spina bifida, I would want to track this guy down.
Any one who has Chiari, or spina bifida or any other birth defects should take folic acid to prevent these types of nural tube defects if you are planning to have children. These defects can start before you even know you are pregnant, so I am taking it everyday now so that my body is ready. Folic acid helps your new cells form properly, and decreases the amount of mutations of new cells. In cancer patients this is very beneficial because the cancer drugs kill a lot of cells, so when a person is making new cells after cancer, it prevents the new cells from having the cancer. Folic acid can even improve the health of sperm, so it really is a good thing for anyone.

Hope everyone is having a good day out there, and hope we hear from Selma soon. : (          Stacey