16-20 WEEKS: SCREENING FOR FOETAL ABNORMALITIES
The weeks between sixteen and twenty are the earliest time that it is possible to detect any foetal abnormalities and the optimum time for a test which may pick up on some of them. If it is left until later the test is less reliable. However, the line between normal and abnormal is seldom as clear cut as it is often presented. What is normal is very much determined by prevailing social conditions. 'Facts' about 'abnormality' should be seen in this light, since people are often left with the impression that the issues are far more clear cut than they are.
Where there is any hint of abnormality a good doctor will lay out the facts as fully as possible and then leave it up to the parents to decide whether to continue with the pregnancy. 'I take as long as it takes to come to some sort of feeling that the parents have understood,' explains Maj Hulten, a clinical geneticist who believes it is important to ensure that people understand fully the implications of an abnormality. 'It could take up to three quarters of an hour. Then I would give them my home telephone number in case there are any other questions and so that we can keep in contact for the following two or three days.'
Unfortunately she is not typical. More often the information is relayed by a doctor who may have no special qualification in the area and who will give only minimal information. He or she may even expect a snap decision about whether the parents-to-be want to opt for abortion. Others will perform a test only on the understanding that if there is an abnormality there will be an abortion. Make sure this does not happen to you. Don't be railroaded. It may well take a lot of time before you are ready to make such an important decision.
There are three abnormalities which may be able to be diagnosed at this stage in pregnancy: chromosome abnormalities, neural tube defects (NTDs), and single gene disorders.
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Women's Health
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HOW FOODS CAN PREVENT BREAST CANCER: DECREASE ESTROGENS
Here's how to counter the ill effects of bad, recycled, chemical, and free estrogens.
Bad Estrogen
Even if you produce moderate to high amounts of estrogen, there is an emerging strategy to blunt its potency. You can actually channel your estrogen into good estrogen rather than bad estrogen by eating a diet high in cruciferous vegetables. Those include cauliflower, broccoli, and cabbage. Both exercise and low body fat also increase the production of good estrogen. Alcohol, polyunsaturated fats, and too much body fat all increase the production of bad estrogen.
Recycled Estrogen
When estrogen is transported from the bloodstream through the liver and into the bowel for disposal, it is assisted by large amounts of fiber in the bowel. That fiber binds to estrogen in the intestine so that the body cannot reabsorb it, ensuring that it is excreted with other waste products. However, when there is too little fiber in the diet, the estrogen remains free in the bowel and may be reabsorbed by the body into the bloodstream, raising the amount of estrogen in the bloodstream. A study at Tufts University showed that the more a woman's bowel movement weighed, the lower was her blood estrogen level. The assumption is that the increased weight of the bowel movement was due to the fiber.
Free Estrogen
The most effective way to decrease the amount of free estrogen in the blood is to build more of the carriers that bind estrogen in the blood and keep it from estrogen receptors. Lets look at the key strategies. The prime regulator of estrogen carriers is the hormone insulin, according to Banoo Parpia of the China-Cornell-Oxford Project. The lower you can drop your insulin, the more estrogen carriers your body manufactures. A low-fat diet also reduces the amount of free estrogen in healthy postmenopausal women. Soy also manufactures more carriers. A high-fiber diet helps to bind more free estrogen in your blood and keeps it at lower, safer levels. Many of these measures also decrease estrogen production, so you are cutting your cancer risk in at least two separate ways.
Chemical Estrogen
The most aggressive prevention includes avoiding animal and fish products with high fat contents that can pick up and concentrate large quantities of chemical estrogens and pesticides. The worst offenders and how to avoid them are found in the chapter "Step 8: Avoid Chemical Estrogens." Eating organic foods that have always been pesticide-free will help you to avoid contaminating breast fat. Washing all fruits and vegetables thoroughly will help remove pesticides. Since most women already have high stores of chemical estrogens in their breast fats there are two other strategies that have proved to be beneficial. First is breast-feeding, which flushes pesticides out of their storage site in breast fat. That does mean that your infant ingests milk with chemical estrogens, but pediatricians do not believe this is harmful. The most practical strategy of all is to consume large amounts of estrogen blockers such as soy, which block the effect of these chemicals at the estrogen receptors on breast cells.
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Womens health
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