Medical Health Care Advices

We know that maintaining good nutrition during pregnancy is extremely important, and much more it will be if the pregnancy is multiple as in this case we have to nurture the development of several babies.

To maintain good nutrition during multiple pregnancy is necessary to follow strict diet which includes:

* Eat calcium: It is important that pregnant women with multiple pregnancy in your diet consumed more milk or orange juice fortified with calcium, broccoli, sardines or other calcium-rich foods. A woman who is going to have more than one baby at a time, you need between 1600 and 2000 milligrams of calcium daily.
* Take folic acid: folic acid one month before and during the first three months of pregnancy helps reduce the risk of babies born with neural tube defect (such as spina bifida)
* Increase the intake of proteins: Proteins play many important functions in our body, are like the building materials used to make body tissues. This nutrient also acts as enzymes that regulate chemical reactions to ensure the growth and function of the body.
* Increase the supply of iron: Iron is important to maintain adequate levels of hemoglobin, the substance of red blood cells that delivers oxygen to tissues. Iron deficiency can cause anemia and multiple pregnancies is quite common to see such cases.

Anemia can cause loss of appetite and extreme fatigue during pregnancy, as well as an insufficient supply of oxygen to developing babies. Iron is absorbed more easily when combined with acidic foods such as yogurt and other vitamin C rich orange juice.

* You must increase the supply of nutrients such as zinc, copper and vitamins C and D. It is important to take prenatal vitamin supplements every day, but that does not mean you should take more than one dose of the supplement, with enough. An excess of vitamins can be harmful for babies.

Prevention

The most important thing is prevention, so that all pregnant women be monitored with a midwife from the beginning of her pregnancy, the examinations that you ask your doctor and be aware of warning signs and symptoms (headache, excessive weight, vision, flashing lights and upper abdominal pain). If a patient has risk factors is important that your doctor tells you drugs are useful in preventing this disease, such as calcium, fish oil and others. It is also important a balanced diet.

Treatment

It is important that the diagnosis is made by a physician and assessed by laboratory tests. The behavior depends on the type of preeclampsia:

If preeclampsia is mild treatment at home is most important thing is rest and marked diet and antihypertensive.

On the other hand if preeclampsia is severe, the patient should be hospitalized and was hypertensive and drugs should indicate that prevent it, seizures (eclampsia). Must be serial laboratory studies to evaluate the severity of the disease and to treat complications time or if possible prevent them.

Of course, we must evaluate the fetus through ultrasonography and fetal well tests.

If the fetus is mature you have to terminate the pregnancy, either normal or cesarean delivery.

If you are not there to help mature their lungs mature through medicines and then performing the abortion.

The most important thing is prevention: Make adequate prenatal care, indicate if there are medications to prevent risk factors, treat it if it already exists to prevent and complicate progress and watch for warning signs and symptoms:

High blood pressure.

Excessive weight gain in a short time.

Swelling.

Headache.

Light Vision.

Upper abdominal pain.

Preeclampsia Is the presence of high blood pressure in a pregnant woman, accompanied by loss of protein in the urine and fluid retention.

It is the most common medical conditions in pregnancy. May complicate eclampsia (seizures during pregnancy), HELLP syndrome (alteration in liver enzymes, low platelets and red blood cell destruction), pulmonary edema, renal failure, placental abruption, etc.

Signs – Symptoms

Preeclampsia occurs after the 20th week of pregnancy. It is characterized by:

High blood pressure (BP ³ 140/90 mmHg)

Edema (swelling) important

Weight gain greater than expected

Neurological symptoms: Headache, vision flashing lights, upper abdominal pain, reflexes excited.

Classification

According to the severity of symptoms and signs are classified as:

Mild preeclampsia: blood pressure is between 140/90 mmHg and 159/109 mmHg, and no neurological symptoms.

Severe preeclampsia: blood pressure greater than or equal to 160/110 mmHg, and there are neurological symptoms.

Risk Factors

There are factors that make a pregnant woman to have more risks than other to develop preeclampsia. These are: to be primigravida (first pregnancy), primigravida early (less than 16 years) or years (30 years), Obesity, black race, pre-pregnancy medical conditions such as hypertension, diabetes, kidney disease.

Hypertension is the most common medical complication of pregnancy, some authors is the second medical complication of pregnancy only after the anemia is most common in young people during the first pregnancy and older nulliparous, pre-hypertensive and diabetic. Every three minutes a woman dies in the world due to preeclampsia. It affects between 3-10% (average 5%) of pregnancies, is the leading cause of maternal death in the world and the United States representing at least 15% of deaths related to pregnancy. In Mexico, it is also the most common complication of pregnancy, the incidence is 47.3 per 1000 births and is also the first cause of hospitalization of pregnant patients to intensive care units (due to massive bleeding, to receive hemodynamic support ), according to health department (2001) mortality due to pregnancy complications occupies the 15th place in the overall hospital mortality. In addition, the rate of preeclampsia has increased by 40% in the period between 1990 and 199 915 and is up to 40% of iatrogenic premature deliveries.

Preeclampsia is a clinical syndrome characterized by multiple organ dysfunction hypertension, proteinuria, edema. Believed to be an endothelial disorder that results from poor perfusion of the placenta releases factors that damage the endothelium to activate the coagulation cascade or increase the sensitivity of the endothelium to pressor agents.