Malrotation Awareness,..
If you have a Myspace, even if you're rarely on.. Add these people.. You could potentially save a life..
wwww.myspace.com/malrotationawareness
This is from their page..
Malrotation and volvulus. Such horrible names, with an unbearable outcome. Let me ask you; have you ever heard of it? I never had. Until October 2008 I never knew such words existed. My beautiful, active, healthy, intelligent, and most of all precious daughter, Georgia, died October 23, 2008 from these horrible words. She was 11 months old and went to Heaven 7 days before her first birthday. Because of her death and because of how apparently common, but unheard of these conditions are, we are compelled to do our best to make sure that malrotation and volvulus does not go unheard of any more. If this page and these words help to save just one baby from dying then we and Georgia have succeeded. So please, give us a moment of your time out of your busy day and read on. You could help save a life and spare a family the hellish pain of losing a child. Malrotation Malrotation is a birth defect that occurs during the 10th week of pregnancy. The intestines are formed between the 5th and 10th weeks of pregnancy, and from what I understand the intestines travel from the umbilical cord inside the fetus. As the intestines are moving into the fetus they make a series of turns inside the body and stay that way for the rest of your life. Apparently there are a number of specific turns the intestines have to make in order for everything to be in place and no problems. When the intestines do not make the correct turns that is when malrotation occurs. Some people live their whole life with malrotation and never have a problem. As many as 40% of patients with malrotation present within the first week of life. This condition is diagnosed in 50% of patients by age 1 month and is diagnosed in 75% by age 1 year. The remaining 25% of patients present after age 1 year and into late adulthood; many are recognized intraoperatively during other procedures or at autopsy. The best way it was explained to me is this: it’s like having a TICKING TIME BOMB in your body. Volvulus Malrotation will not necessarily kill you, volvulus will. Volvulus is best explained as the twisting of the intestines. I was told to picture it like this: Imagine an empty swing. You know the ones like at a park or a playground. The swing is empty and the wind is blowing, the swing is moving back and forth. A gust of wind comes through and the swing goes up and around the metal bar holding it and comes back down, twisting and wrapping the chains around the metal bar. Volvulus doesn’t occur unless there is malrotation. It has no warning, it just happens. You can be sitting, bending over, standing up, etc. The intestines twist and cut off blood supply to the intestines which in turn cause the intestines to die. This in turn if not SURGICALLY CORRECTED within a matter of a couple of hours can cause loss of bowel activity, heart attack, stroke, sepsis, failure to thrive, and death. There are signs and symptoms of volvulus; vomiting green or yellow bile, severe abdominal pain, swollen abdomen, drawing up of legs, there are more and I will provide a link later on. What is frightening though is that all of these symptoms may not happen, or they may be intermittent over a long period of time. It didn’t with my daughter. So, how can something so horrible go so elusive through our lives and we never hear about it? It makes me physically sick to know that. Here is a few statistics of birth defects that you may have heard of or your doctor has told you about. The most common type of birth defect is heart defects, affecting 1 in 100 births. Cleft lip/palate defect, affect 1 in 700 births. Neural tube defects which include Spina bifida and Anencephaly affect 1 in 2000 births. Down Syndrome affects 1 in 800 to 1000 births. All or most of these you may have heard of, but get this. MALROTATION affects 1 in 500 births!!! How could this be? How can something that is so life threatening be more common than Down Syndrome or Cleft lip/palate, and never heard about, never advertised, never tested or checked for!! Personally I have looked in three medical books that were given to us during our first pregnancy and malrotation and volvulus are nowhere in them. We had two different obstetricians, in two different cities and neither of them ever informed us of anything like this. There are no pamphlets or hand-outs lying around the obstetrician’s office to let you know. Worst of it is, they don’t check for it. The malrotation can be seen through ultrasound, or even a simple x-ray. I know this for a fact, I have seen an ultrasound photo of malrotation and volvulus during pregnancy and after Georgia passed we took out son to be checked and the doctor took an x-ray to check for it. Our main goal is awareness. I was told that it only takes one person to spread the word and make a difference. That’s what we are hoping for. It is my personal goal to make expectant mothers and new mothers aware of this hidden killer. Why it has been hidden for so long, I will never know. We need your help though. I understand that life is hectic and most of you barely have the time to read this, but without you and your word-of-mouth we don’t stand a chance. So please help us. If you know anyone who is pregnant or who has a newborn, tell them about this site, tell them to have their OB check for this defect during their ultrasound, or tell them to get their doctor to order an x-ray for their newborn. It is well worth the time. If we had known that this defect ever existed we would have had both of our babies checked before birth. No one should ever have to know the pain of losing a child. No one should ever have to know the pain of losing a child to something that is preventable and easily corrected before it turns fatal. My daughter would want us to do this, to get the word out. So please help us. Thank you for your time in reading about this, take care, spread the word, and God bless. Here are a few web sites that have more information about malrotation and volvulus and other birth defects. http://kidshealth.org/parent/medical/digestive/malrotation.html http://emedicine.medscape.com/article/930313-overview http://kidshealth.org/parent/system/ill/birth_defects.html http://www.eapsa.org/parents/resources/rotational.cfm
wwww.myspace.com/malrotationawareness
This is from their page..
Malrotation and volvulus. Such horrible names, with an unbearable outcome. Let me ask you; have you ever heard of it? I never had. Until October 2008 I never knew such words existed. My beautiful, active, healthy, intelligent, and most of all precious daughter, Georgia, died October 23, 2008 from these horrible words. She was 11 months old and went to Heaven 7 days before her first birthday. Because of her death and because of how apparently common, but unheard of these conditions are, we are compelled to do our best to make sure that malrotation and volvulus does not go unheard of any more. If this page and these words help to save just one baby from dying then we and Georgia have succeeded. So please, give us a moment of your time out of your busy day and read on. You could help save a life and spare a family the hellish pain of losing a child. Malrotation Malrotation is a birth defect that occurs during the 10th week of pregnancy. The intestines are formed between the 5th and 10th weeks of pregnancy, and from what I understand the intestines travel from the umbilical cord inside the fetus. As the intestines are moving into the fetus they make a series of turns inside the body and stay that way for the rest of your life. Apparently there are a number of specific turns the intestines have to make in order for everything to be in place and no problems. When the intestines do not make the correct turns that is when malrotation occurs. Some people live their whole life with malrotation and never have a problem. As many as 40% of patients with malrotation present within the first week of life. This condition is diagnosed in 50% of patients by age 1 month and is diagnosed in 75% by age 1 year. The remaining 25% of patients present after age 1 year and into late adulthood; many are recognized intraoperatively during other procedures or at autopsy. The best way it was explained to me is this: it’s like having a TICKING TIME BOMB in your body. Volvulus Malrotation will not necessarily kill you, volvulus will. Volvulus is best explained as the twisting of the intestines. I was told to picture it like this: Imagine an empty swing. You know the ones like at a park or a playground. The swing is empty and the wind is blowing, the swing is moving back and forth. A gust of wind comes through and the swing goes up and around the metal bar holding it and comes back down, twisting and wrapping the chains around the metal bar. Volvulus doesn’t occur unless there is malrotation. It has no warning, it just happens. You can be sitting, bending over, standing up, etc. The intestines twist and cut off blood supply to the intestines which in turn cause the intestines to die. This in turn if not SURGICALLY CORRECTED within a matter of a couple of hours can cause loss of bowel activity, heart attack, stroke, sepsis, failure to thrive, and death. There are signs and symptoms of volvulus; vomiting green or yellow bile, severe abdominal pain, swollen abdomen, drawing up of legs, there are more and I will provide a link later on. What is frightening though is that all of these symptoms may not happen, or they may be intermittent over a long period of time. It didn’t with my daughter. So, how can something so horrible go so elusive through our lives and we never hear about it? It makes me physically sick to know that. Here is a few statistics of birth defects that you may have heard of or your doctor has told you about. The most common type of birth defect is heart defects, affecting 1 in 100 births. Cleft lip/palate defect, affect 1 in 700 births. Neural tube defects which include Spina bifida and Anencephaly affect 1 in 2000 births. Down Syndrome affects 1 in 800 to 1000 births. All or most of these you may have heard of, but get this. MALROTATION affects 1 in 500 births!!! How could this be? How can something that is so life threatening be more common than Down Syndrome or Cleft lip/palate, and never heard about, never advertised, never tested or checked for!! Personally I have looked in three medical books that were given to us during our first pregnancy and malrotation and volvulus are nowhere in them. We had two different obstetricians, in two different cities and neither of them ever informed us of anything like this. There are no pamphlets or hand-outs lying around the obstetrician’s office to let you know. Worst of it is, they don’t check for it. The malrotation can be seen through ultrasound, or even a simple x-ray. I know this for a fact, I have seen an ultrasound photo of malrotation and volvulus during pregnancy and after Georgia passed we took out son to be checked and the doctor took an x-ray to check for it. Our main goal is awareness. I was told that it only takes one person to spread the word and make a difference. That’s what we are hoping for. It is my personal goal to make expectant mothers and new mothers aware of this hidden killer. Why it has been hidden for so long, I will never know. We need your help though. I understand that life is hectic and most of you barely have the time to read this, but without you and your word-of-mouth we don’t stand a chance. So please help us. If you know anyone who is pregnant or who has a newborn, tell them about this site, tell them to have their OB check for this defect during their ultrasound, or tell them to get their doctor to order an x-ray for their newborn. It is well worth the time. If we had known that this defect ever existed we would have had both of our babies checked before birth. No one should ever have to know the pain of losing a child. No one should ever have to know the pain of losing a child to something that is preventable and easily corrected before it turns fatal. My daughter would want us to do this, to get the word out. So please help us. Thank you for your time in reading about this, take care, spread the word, and God bless. Here are a few web sites that have more information about malrotation and volvulus and other birth defects. http://kidshealth.org/parent/medical/digestive/malrotation.html http://emedicine.medscape.com/article/930313-overview http://kidshealth.org/parent/system/ill/birth_defects.html http://www.eapsa.org/parents/resources/rotational.cfm