World Prematurity Day 2014 brings a focus on preventing preterm births
November 17 is World Prematurity Day — a time to push the importance of prenatal care and women’s health.
One out of seven babies in El Paso is born premature. In most cases, the cause behind the early delivery is not known.
The parents of Christopher Paul Gallegos are among those who still don’t know why their son came 16 weeks early. Baby Christopher was born August 19 at 1 lb 7 oz. He’s hooked up to numerous pieces of medical equipment at Del Sol Medical Center’s Neonatal Intensive Care Unit.
“It’s my first baby, so I didn’t know what a contraction was — and that I was having contractions,” said Christopher’s mom, Erika Gonzalez, as she described the day her son was born.
“Panic settled. And I said, ‘My baby was not due until December. What is going on here?”
It’s a question that still has no answer.
Gonzalez’s experience not unique, either.
“It can happen to anybody,” said Del Sol’s NICU director Camille Gerdes. “The babies we take care of — none of them were planned to be in this department.”
Gerdes said the NICU nurses work closely with the March of Dimes — an organization dedicated to raising money for the education of potential mothers about the need to stay healthy before and during pregnancy.
“You have to be able to do everything you can yourself to prevent premature delivery,” said Gerdes, emphasizing the importance of eating healthy and taking prenatal vitamins even before a pregnancy occurs.
“It is extremely important.”
Gonzalez said she and her husband abided by those guidelines. But she takes what little comfort she can knowing that her good health may have contributed to her son’s good health. The new mom told ABC-7 the doctors are encouraged that little Christopher has no problems with brain bleeding, breathing and putting on weight — all health issues premature babies face in the early stages. Their cautious optimism gives Gonzalez hope for Christopher, and any future children with her husband.
“I want to know next time that if I have the blessing of being pregnant again, that I can count on an organization like March of Dimes that’s doing the research and finding the why and what I can do as a mother to prevent this in the future.”
According to the March of Dimes’ premature birth report card released last week, 12.3 percent of births in Texas come before 37 weeks of pregnancy, down from 13.7 in 2006. The March of Dimes cites two reasons for the high premature birth rate: the statistic showing 14.7 percent of women smoke and 31 percent don’t have health insurance.
The national preterm birth rate fell to 11.4 percent in 2013 — the lowest in 17 years. The United States still has one of the highest rates of preterm birth of any high resource country.
