November 08, 2014
World Prematurity Day and RSV Prevention
I participated in an Influencer Activation on behalf of Influence Central for MedImmune. I received product samples to facilitate my review as well as a promotional item to thank me for my participation. #MC #RSVAwareness #PreemieProtection
Did you know that November 17th is World Prematurity Day? For some reason, until this year, I did not even know that there is a prematurity day. Something that you may not know about me is that I was born a month earlier than my Mom's due date. My siblings also were born early. My brother was 26 days early and my sister was 29 days early.
We all had health issues related to being born early. I had popped a hole in my lung and was in the NICU for 10 days. My mom had to be on bedrest with each of us because she was having premature labor. Premature births hit very close to home for our family. Ironically, my birthday is three days after prematurity day (November 20th).
When I was pregnant with Adalyn, I was concerned that she would be born early since my siblings and I had all been born so early. About a month or month and a half before her birth, I made sure everything was 100% ready in case she came early. Luckily, she was born fully matured at three days past my due date in perfect health.
I also recently learned about RSV which stands for Respiratory Synctial Virus. It is a common seasonal virus that most kids contract by the age of 2. It causes cold like symptoms in healthy, full-term babies. It is mostly contracted from November to March. It is the leading cause of hospitalization for babies with 125,000 hospitalizations and 200 deaths per year. So scary.
So what does this have to do with World Prematurity Day? Babies that are born premature are at higher risk for having severe RSV and are twice as likely to be hospitalized than full-term babies.
Symptoms include: coughing or wheezing, blueish color around the mouth or fingernails, gasping and fever. This disease is contagious and can be spread through touching, sneezing and coughing. There is no treatment for this illness so prevention is very important.
To prevent RSV, wash your hands, keep baby items clean, avoid crowds and don't let people smoke around your child.
Honestly, I am very glad to have learned about this illness since I have a baby now. If you know someone with a baby, consider telling them about RSV so that they can help prevent their child from getting it.
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What a coincidence, I share my birthday with World Prematurity Day! My mom had no problems carrying both my sister and I to term (I was actually a month LATE and my sister had to be induced) but I know some friends who delivered early and it's a very scary thing to go through.
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