Sirenomelia
What are the other Names for this condition? (also known as / synonyms)
• Mermaid Syndrome
• Sirenomelia Sequence
• Midline Disorder
• Sirenomelus
What is it? (Definition/Background information) • Sirenomelia is a birth defect that causes the legs to fuse together. This medical condition of malformation varies from person to person and occurs 1 in every 70,000 to 100,000 births. Fetus usually dies in the womb, during birth or usually right after birth.
Who gets it? (Age and Sex Distribution)
• Developing fetus of both genders
What are the Risk Factors? (Predisposing factors)
• A normal fetus has two arteries and one vein. However, fetus with Sirenomelia only has one umbilical artery and one vein, which
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During pregnancy:
• If diagnose early in the pregnancy and depending on the severity of the syndrome, the doctor might advice the patient to terminate the pregnancy After birth:
• Surgical separation of the lower extremity if patient’s health is in good shape
• If necessary for survival, patient’s lower extremity will have to be amputated
• Doctors will have to create an external waste pouch due to the absent of genital organs
• Kidney transplant if original kidneys fail or was not present
• Surgeries to reconstruct certain parts of the body, like the urinary tract and gastrointestinal outlet tracts, for proper body functions
How can it be Prevented?
Since doctors do not know the exact cause, they’re unable to determine the environmental prevention and the genetic factors. No one knows if this condition is hereditary or not. Sirenomelia is such a rare condition that there is no known prevention. However, proper prenatal care and visits to the doctor should ensure a healthy pregnancy.
What is the Prognosis (outcomes/ resolutions)?
If Sirenomelia is diagnosed early in the pregnancy, doctor might advice the patient to terminate the pregnancy. Those that make it through birth survive for a couple hours or days. This is such a rare condition that not a lot of people know about nor have heard of it.
Additional and Relevant Useful Information:
As of today, three survivors have lived pass the first month after being born.
• Shiloh Jade Pepin had no bladder,
replaces it with a condom catheter attached to a drainage bag since the patient has a
Premature babies sometimes have apnea. It may happen together with a slow heart rate. Respiratory distress syndrome or RDS is a breathing problem most common in babies born before 34 weeks of pregnancy.” Babies with RDS don’t have a protein called surfactant that keeps small air sacs in the lungs from collapsing. “Intraventricular hemorrhage or IVH is bleeding in the brain. It usually happens near the ventricles in the center of the brain. A ventricles is a space in the brain that’s filled with fluid. Patent ductus ateriosus or PDA is a heart problem that happens in the connection between two major blood vessels near the heart. If the ductus do not close properly after birth, a baby can have breathing problems or heart failure. Heart failure is when enough blood can’t get pumped into the heart causing it to shut down. Necrotizing enter colitis (NEC) is a problem with a baby’s intestines. It causes feeding problems, a swollen belly and diarrhea. It sometimes happens 2 to 3 weeks after a premature bay has been born. Retinopathy of prematurity (ROP) is an abnormal growth of blood vessels in the eye. ROP can lead to vision loss. Jaundice is when a baby's eyes and skin look yellow. A baby has jaundice when his liver isn't fully developed or isn't working well. Anemia is when a baby doesn’t have enough healthy red blood cells to carry oxygen to the rest of the body. Bronchopulmonary dysplasia (BPD) is a lung condition that can develop in premature babies as well as babies who have treatment with a breathing machine. Babies with BPD sometimes develop fluid in the lungs, scarring and lung damage. Premature babies often have trouble fighting off germs because their immune systems are not fully formed. Infections that may affect a premature baby include pneumonia, a lung infection; sepsis, a blood infection; and meningitis, an infection in the fluid around the brain and
By dates, the patient is 35 5/7 weeks and the measurements are concordant. The amniotic fluid volume is normal. The fetus is in cephalic presentation. The BPP and Doppler studies are reassuring. A complete fetal anatomical survey was performed and no major malformations were noted at this time within the resolution of the ultrasound equipment other than the fetal abdomen. There is a cystic structure seen in the fetal abdomen that is about 3 cm in diameter with some echolucency surrounding this. It is below the kidney but above the fetal bladder as identified in your office.
On ultrasound, there is a live fetus in breech presentation. Fetal biometry is symmetric and consistent with dates. A detailed anatomic survey was overall unremarkable but we were unable to adequately obtain fetal cardiac views in order to complete the echocardiogram. Both myself and the sonographer scanned and unfortunately the fetus remained in the spine up position after an extended amount of
Exposure to high levels of mercury or lead may also be a contributing factor, as well as prolonged hyperthermia and obesity. Hispanic women are at a greater risk for having a child born with this type of defect. Once a woman has had an anencephalic child, she has a 1 in 10 chance of having another baby with this birth defect.
This particular case study involves a 29 year old obstetric patient who presented to the labor and delivery unit at 33 weeks gestation with complaints of abdominal pain for the past three days that had become more severe and absence of fetal movement noted since the previous evening. Her obstetric history revealed she has one living child and has had one previous miscarriage at ten weeks
These organs would then be transplanted into someone whose had previously failed or is in the process of shutting down.
LNS is a recessive disease that is carried by mothers and passed down to their sons. It is highly unlikely that a female would have LNS because two copies of the mutated gene would need to be present. One of these copies would be inherited from her father, which is not likely because males with LNS do not have children due to the effects of the gene. However, some females carry the disease, but they are silent
Modernism transformed life in Australia across five tumultuous decades from 1917 to 1967 , it spans all aspect of Australian culture including art, design, architecture, advertising, film, photography and fashion. The process of modernisation has had a profound affect, changing our perspectives and the course of our everyday living.
Her pregnancy was going fine until she reached 18 weeks and an ultrasound revealed a “bubble” on the fetus’s neck. When the doctors first saw it they thought it was a treatable tumor called a teratoma, Lindsay and her husband Matt were hopeful that the fetus could survive. Over the next few weeks the doctors ran further tests and ultrasounds and confirmed that the fetus had a lymphangioma, a rare, noncancerous congenital tumor that can involve the head and neck and can cause fatal swelling and obstruct airways. They learned that it was growing out of her neck and back into the back of her neck, her chest, her mouth, and the orbit of her right eye. Doctors gave Paradiso a grim prognosis and said that the baby wouldn’t survive past 27 weeks, a time when it could be viable for delivery and potential life-saving operations, they had told her that her chances of living were very small. (Goldberg
Disease, which is very rare the baby could suffer defects in the brain and the
It is easy to see that the medical abilities and tools we had 50 years ago are nothing in comparison to what we have today. Among these advances has been the extent to which we can prevent illness and disability. Fetal surgery first emerged in the 1980’s by Dr Michael Harrison aka “the father of fetal surgery,” when he decided to look into ways doctors could fix certain defects before birth to avoid their inevitable, devastating consequences. It has since expanded its practice to a number of hospitals across the country, although it is still an uncommon procedure. It involves opening up the mother 's uterus (just as a doctor would during a caesarean section) so that the fetus is exposed as much as needed to be operated on. The fetus is then put back and the uterus is closed until it is time for the mother to go into labor. The fetus is never detached from the mother and is essentially being operated on while inside the womb (Smajdor). While it may seem like a positive life changing procedure, there are many perspectives out there that support
G4 P3003 (4 Gestations, 3 Full Term, 0 Preterm, 0 Miscarriages, 3 Currently Living); 3 Spontaneous Vaginal Deliveries; Last birth was 7 years ago by SVD, weighed 4000 grams; No previous obstetrical complications or morbidity; No past medical history; No past surgical history; No prior antenatal care
pregnancy. This serious complication results in a miscarriage and can cause death of the mother.
Several chronic maternal medical conditions, including diabetes mellitus, hypertension, connective tissue disorders, and congenital heart disease confer an increased risk of CHD in the offspring. (3)