Thursday, April 3, 2003Fetal Alcohol Syndrome
Women who drink while pregnant could be doing serious damage to their unborn child. Continuing his week-long series on alcohol, Dr. Ken Davis discusses fetal alcohol syndrome in today’s Sixty Second Housecall.
If you are pregnant, everything you eat and drink affects your baby. If you drink alcohol, it can hurt your baby’s growth. Your baby could have physical and emotional problems that can last for the rest of his life. Children born with the most serious problems caused by alcohol have fetal alcohol syndrome.
Children with Fetal Alcohol Syndrome may:
• Be born small.
• Have problems eating and sleeping.
• Have problems seeing and hearing.
• Have trouble following directions and learning how to do simple things.
• Have trouble getting along with others and controlling their behavior.
• Need special teachers and schools.
Drinking any kind of alcohol when you are pregnant can hurt your baby. Alcohol can hurt a baby even when you are only one or two months pregnant.
If you drank alcohol before you knew you were pregnant, stop drinking now. You will feel better and your baby will have a good chance to be born healthy. For more information, log onto wtva.com and click on Sixty Second Housecall. For North Mississippi Medical Center, I’m Dr. Ken Davis.