Alcohol & Pregnancy: Benefits of Small Amounts, Risks of Excess - Paper Example

Introduction

Alcohol intake has adverse negative effects on the development of the child and the health of the mother. However, studies show that during the early stages of pregnancy, women who occasionally take a small amount of alcohol have reduced risks of developing complications like high blood pressure (Mamluk et al., 2017). Furthermore, when a mother consumes little alcohol during the trimester of pregnancy, there are also reduced risks in child development. However, it is highly advisable that all pregnant women entirely refrain from any alcohol consumption.

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The case study of a 37 years pregnant woman is risky to the developing child since it gets observed that the woman consumes alcohol daily. The CDC argues that any alcohol consumption during the pregnancy period causes the developing child to have abnormal growth (2020). Since the development of a child’s brain takes place at all the stages of the pregnancy, any exposure to alcohol can interfere with healthy brain growth. Furthermore, in the early stages of the pregnancy, any small exposure of alcohol to the growing fetus causes abnormal development in the child’s facial and nervous system.

Responding To Pregnant Woman Concerning Drinking

Therefore, my response to the 37-year-old pregnant would discourage any alcohol intake. The fact that the woman takes one to two drinks per day suggests that she consumes a lot of it by the end of the week without knowing. Therefore, I could urge the lady to stop the alcohol intake since she is at the critical stage where the brain development of a child takes place.

Discuss the Effects of Fetal Alcohol Syndrome

One of the adverse effects on a child associated with women consuming alcohol during pregnancy is fetal alcohol syndrome, FAS. The syndrome causes the child to be born with defective mental and physical features (Denny, Coles & Blitz, 2017). The syndrome is associated with alcohol passing through the placenta to the child. Since the fetus cannot process alcohol well – it hampers the supply of oxygen to the vital organs. As a result, somebody organs fail to develop correctly until the baby is born. Some of the adverse effects of fetal alcohol syndrome include a child being born with abnormal facial features, below average weight and height, underdeveloped brain, and many more (Denny, Coles & Blitz, 2017). Children with fetal alcohol syndrome have sparse learning and coordination ability, delayed development in social and language skills, and other disabilities like walking, among others.

A Young Mother with 2-Weeks Old Infant

Chickenpox is one of the diseases categorized as communicable – since it gets spread by contact with the infected person. The infection of chickenpox in people occurs due to exposure to the virus called varicella-zoster (Shrim et al., 2018). After an individual gets exposed to the virus, it enters the body and starts replicating itself in the lymphoid tissues – then it keeps on spreading. This case is one among many that nurses usually receives daily. Since the mother mentioned that the friend’s son had just gotten over the chickenpox disease, the first step is to calm her down.

Will My Baby Get Chickenpox?

The incubation period for chickenpox is fourteen to twenty-one days after, and the individual suffers from it. Therefore, as the nurse, I would seek to get precise information about her friend’s son’s post-infection period of chickenpox. If I find that the post-infection period is more than twenty-one days, then the mother shall be advised to relax since her child was not in any danger.

Passive and Active Immunity

The bodies of human beings usually develop a mechanism of resisting infections in two ways – that is the active immunity and passive immunity. The active-immunity usually develops as a result of the body getting exposed to the disease causative agent – causing the body to trigger a defense mechanism. On the other hand, passive immunity gets transmitted to a person’s body from another person. For instance, if antibodies against a particular disease pass from the mother through the placenta to the fetus, the baby acquires passive immunity (Shrim et al., 2018). In our cases, there is a very high possibility the mother could have passed the passive-immunity to the fetus at the time she was pregnant.

What Key Point Should The Nurse Be Sure To Mention?

The introduction of chickenpox vaccines has significantly reduced the cases of chickenpox. Therefore, it is infrequent to find infants getting exposed to it. However, those kids who come in contact with people with chickenpox usually develop mild symptoms because of the already passive immunity they might have acquired from their mother (Shrim et al., 2018). Furthermore, children below the age of twelve months do not get chickenpox vaccines. Thus, in case the two-year-old infant gets exposed to the boy before the incubation period is over, the mother should watch for symptoms in the next one to two days. The chickenpox symptoms would include fever, pain, and itchy rashes that make the baby very uncomfortable. In such scenarios, the baby drinks a lot of fluid because of the high-temperature and shower in oatmeal baths to reduce skin irritation (Shrim et al., 2018). Additionally, some painkillers like paracetamol can get administered to alleviate the pain from the child’s body.

A 16-Year-Old Female

What Confirmatory Tests For Hepatitis C Would The Nurse Expect To Be Ordered?

In diagnosing hepatitis C condition, medical practitioners usually perform several tests to determine if the infection is mild or advanced. The first diagnostic tests include the hepatitis C virus (HCV)-antibody enzyme immunoassay (EIA) (Nasrullah et al., 2017). If the results come out positive, it indicates that the patient has a current infection that could either be acute or chronic. Furthermore, a positive can also mean a patient has a passed resolved infection. Another essential test to consider is the hepatitis C virus (HCV) RNA polymerase chain reaction (PCR) – which primarily indicates a patient has a current or active infection. The last diagnostic test to consider is serum aminotransferases, which determine if the patient’s condition has become elevated.

Additionally, physicians can order other tests to eliminate other conditions which might have similar symptoms with hepatitis C. One of the test is the viral genotyping whose results may indicate response to antiviral therapy in individual patients. Moreover, noninvasive tests of liver fibrosis or elasticity might become used to affirm or exclude advanced fibrosis. Similarly, the inflammation gets determined by performing a liver biopsy test on the patient. Also, testing for co-infection might show positive results if the patient has hepatitis B or HIV (Nasrullah et al., 2017).

When The Patient’s Tests Come Back Positive For Hepatitis C, What Medications Might Be Ordered?

In scenarios where the lab test comes back positive, the first-line treatment should be to start antiviral therapy treatment to all patients with the hepatitis C virus. The two common antiviral therapy drugs used in the treatment of hepatitis C disease is the pegylated interferon (PEG-INF) and ribavirin (RBV) (Nasrullah et al., 2017). It is imperative to note that the same drugs used for acute hepatitis C also treats chronic hepatitis C.

What Will The Nurse Include In-Patient Teaching For This Client?

Patient education is one of the most critical parts in ensuring the effective management of a particular disease. The nurse educating a patient on hepatitis C can sensitize an individual on the need to avoid alcoholic drinks since they hasten the spread of liver disease. Furthermore, the doctors must discuss the medical plan with the patient and encourage them to avoid all medications that can cause liver damage. Another vital lesson is advising the patient to practice a healthy lifestyle, which minimizes the exchange of blood and body fluid with other people to reduce transmission. Furthermore, the patient ought to use condoms at all times when engaging in sex with her partners.

References

CDC. (2020, April 30). Alcohol Use in Pregnancy. Retrieved June 7, 2020, from https://www.cdc.gov/ncbddd/fasd/alcohol-use.html

Denny, L., Coles, S., & Blitz, R. (2017). Fetal alcohol syndrome and fetal alcohol spectrum disorders. American family physician, 96(8), 515-522.

Mamluk, L., Edwards, H. B., Slavonic, J., Leach, V., Jones, T., Moore, T. H. ... & Smith, G. D. (2017). Low alcohol consumption and pregnancy and childhood outcomes: time to change guidelines indicating apparently ‘safe’ levels of alcohol during pregnancy? A systematic review and meta-analyses. BMJ Open, 7(7), e015410.

Nasrullah, M., Sergeenko, D., Gvinjilia, L., Gamkrelidze, A., Tsertsvadze, T., Butsashvili, M. ... & Ward, J. W. (2017). The role of screening and treatment in national progress toward hepatitis C elimination—Georgia, 2015–2016. MMWR. Morbidity and mortality weekly report, 66(29), 773.

Shrim, A., Koren, G., Yudin, M. H., & Farine, D. (2018). No. 274-Management of Varicella Infection (Chickenpox) in pregnancy. Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology Canada, 40(8), e652-e657.