Skip to main content

How rhesus factor affects your unborn child




By Dr Ombeva Malande


Dear Dr Ombeva,

I am a B- and my husband is B+ blood group. Do you think I will be able to give birth to a normal healthy baby? I am worried because a friend who is O- gave birth and the baby died, and the doctor told her it is because the husband is B+. What can I do to avoid the same fate?

Anxious

Dear Anxious,

We each have a blood group, either A, B, AB or O; that is either positive or negative, depending on whether they have inherited an Rh (Rhesus) factor; where people with a Rh factor are Rh positive while those without are Rh negative.

The Rh factor can cause problems if you (woman) are Rh negative and your foetus is Rh positive - called Rh incompatibility. These problems usually do not occur in a first pregnancy, but they can occur in a later pregnancy.

When an Rh-negative mother’s blood comes into contact with blood from her Rh-positive foetus, it causes the Rh-negative mother to make antibodies against the Rh factor. These antibodies attack the Rh factor as if it were a harmful substance.

A person with Rh-negative blood who makes Rh antibodies is called “Rh sensitised.” If the mother and father are both Rh negative, the baby also will be Rh negative. When a woman has a negative blood group, for example O negative, and her husband has positive blood group, for example O positive; the children may be either positive or negative blood group.

Each time she gives birth, the blood group of baby must be checked immediately after birth. If the baby has a positive blood group like the father, the mom must receive an injection called anti-D; within 72 hours. If the baby has a negative blood group like the mother, then anti-D is NOT needed.

The injection protects the mother’s future Rhesus positive babies from the effect of sensitisation of the mom’s negative rhesus blood by the current new-born baby’s Rhesus positive blood (because the effects are so bad and can kill the future Rhesus positive baby).

In an event where the baby is born rhesus positive and mom is negative and didn’t get the injection after 72hrs, we do the test called the Coombs test, to determine whether the mom got sensitised or not. If the mother and father are Rh positive, then it doesn’t matter whether the father is positive or negative because the mother has the Rhesus itself, so cannot get sensitised, and all her pregnancies are safe.

In addition, any rhesus negative mother should also receive anti-D after pregnancy loss at any time during the pregnancy whether induced abortion or spontaneous loss.

— Dr Ombeva Malande
is a paediatric and child health expert

 SOURCE_EVE WOMENS'S WORLD

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

There is no regret in Obedience

It’s a guarantee your life will never be the same again when you obey God. God is our CREATOR and our DIRECTOR meaning he knows the best way for our lives since he loves us, our role is to simply OBEY Him. Obedience is everything when we are relating to God. Obedience is the KEY ingredient in the kingdom of God. God is always ready to manifest himself in our lives when we obey Him and his word(John 14:23 Jesus Replied, “Anyone who loves me will obey my teaching. My Father will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them.” Like 5:5 Simon Peter an experienced fisherman with a fishing business had toiled the whole night without any catch of fish and he was frustrated and tired and he was washing his nets UNTIL Jesus told him to Launch out into the deep again. Peter had a CHOICE to say YES or NO but he choose to OBEY and he said: “Nevertheless AT THY WORD I WILL LET DOWN THE NET”. The moment he chooses to obey instead of Questioning, Analyzing and trying ...
Post a Comment
Read more

President Uhuru Kenyatta sets ablaze world's biggest Ivory Pile #WorthMoreAlive #IvoryBurn

Kenya has burned more than Sh31 billion worth of ivory in a bold sign of commitment to declaring a war on ivory trade and poaching. President Uhuru Kenyatta on Saturday lit fire on the 105 tonnes of ivory, stack up in 11 huge pyramid-shaped pyres, that is expected to burn for at least three days. Speaking at the burning ceremony, President Kenyatta said Kenya will not tolerate ivory trade even as the country has to grapple with “a new generation of poachers with sophisticated weapons who are threatening national heritage and safety of communities.” By destroying the ivory, we declare once and for all that our National Heritage is not for sale. For us ivory is worthless, unless it is on our elephants said the president Check the pictures below:>>>>>
Post a Comment
Read more

CA sounds alert on fake software

The telecommunications sector watchdog has warned companies and individual Internet users from buying fake software, saying it now offers hackers the most common loophole for executing cyber-attacks. The Communications Authority of Kenya (CA), through the National Computer Incident Response Team Co-ordination Centre (National KE-CIRT/CC), warned on Thursday that cybercriminals have changed tack and are now using third-party software to deliver threats to unsuspecting users in an attempt to compromise and steal their personal data. “Though Kenya has not been adversely affected by such attacks as at now, the trend depicts a serious concern in cybercrime management and thus a precaution should be taken when dealing with outsourced products and personnel,” said acting CA director- general Christopher Kemei in a statement. Kenyan businesses lose billions of shillings and troves of sensitive information to hackers every year. SOURCE
Post a Comment
Read more