Feds urge wider use of heart test on newborns

Resource:  http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2011/08/22/earlyshow/living/parenting/main20095411.shtml?tag=cbsnewsSectionsArea;cbsnewsSectionsArea.5

Summary:  There are lots of newborn babies that are dying because of congenital heart defects.  Heart defects in 1999-2006 have caused over 28,000 deaths.  40,000 babies are born each year with congenital heart defects.  But there is a test that can make sure that a newborn doesn’t have these heart defects.  This machine is called pulse oximetry.    This machine shows how much oxygen a newborn is getting.  This test is inexpensive costing only $1.00 and only takes 45 seconds to run the test.  That $1.00 could help save thousands of newborn babies lives.  The test is as simple as the doctor putting a little tape sensor on the foot.   It will scan to see how much oxygen the newborn is getting.  Depending on where the levels are that gives doctors the wisdom on what to do next.  Here is a mom that went through this problem.  Her name is Jodi Koravos.  She thought that she was going to have a good and healthy baby.  But a couple hours later, after the baby was born, the doctor came to her and told her that her baby was turning blue.  Jodi’s baby had a 50 percent of oxygen level.  So the doctor had to do surgery on the baby.  Jodi’s baby is now fine but still has to have two more surgeries.   Had the baby been monitored after being born they could’ve diagnosed this problem sooner.

 

Critique:  I have learned so much from this article about what happens to a lot of newborns.  Many babies die because they don’t have enough oxygen. Now they have a machine to make sure that the newborns can be checked for how low their oxygen is before they go home. Why if it only costs so little would hospitals not use this monitoring system on a regular basis?  Why even begin to parents of a newborn through traumatic experience when it could so easily be helped.

Impact:  This is an amazing article for people that are pregnant because they can see what they should do before they bring their newborn baby home.  I believe that if an expecting mom new this was available to them for the help of the baby it would give them wisdom to ask the doctor to make sure this test was run.  I believe it is a wise decision to have this test run because if a newborn was taken home and the baby starts having a hard time breathing, which affects the heart, the baby could die.  This simple test could save the baby’s life.