Vitamin Supplements and Your ChildWritten by Jeff Matson
In a perfect world, your children would eat a balanced diet with right amount of fruits and vegetables recommended by nutritional standards. However, we all know that rarely happens. Many children do not like and sometimes refuse to eat some kinds of fruits and vegetables. This makes it difficult to ensure they are receiving a well-balanced diet that provides all vitamins and minerals needed for a healthy life. There are things you can do as a parent to ensure your child is receiving adequate amounts of vitamins and minerals in their diet. Using vitamin and mineral supplements to ensure a well-balanced diet can begin during pregnancy. It is very important for pregnant mothers to obtain recommended dose of folate and vitamin B-6, since it is an essential component in formation of genetic material and hemoglobin in red blood cells. Lack of folic acid can cause mother to become anemic and increases risk of miscarriage. Folic acid deficiency may also cause child to be born with a deformity or disability. If you are pregnant and you feel you cannot obtain adequate amounts of vitamin B-6 on your own, it may be a good idea to look into a vitamin supplement for duration of your pregnancy and talk to your Doctor. Once your child is born there are more steps you can take in first 2 years of their lives, which may increase their vitamin intake and provide a healthier lifestyle. Babies who are breastfed often lack vitamin D. This is not as necessary if mother is eating a well-balanced diet, however breast milk alone does not give baby recommended daily amount of vitamin D. Formula fed babies do not need any vitamin supplementation. Medically approved, commercial iron-fortified formulas provide babies with recommended amount of vitamins they need, so babies require no additional supplements. Giving vitamin supplements to a baby who is already receiving daily recommendation can be harmful and potentially become very dangerous for your child.
| | Antibiotics 101- What You Absolutely Need to Know Written by Mansi gupta
Introduction Antibiotics are said to be greatest contribution of modern day science helping doctors to think beyond microorganinsms.their importance is felt much more in developing countries where infections are prevalent. There is a mushrooming of antibiotics since last few decades because of both need and demand of aseptic conditions both in and out of hospital. What are antibiotics? Antibiotics are chemical or biological substances either produced by microorganisms or are produced artificially to kill or inhibit growth of other microorganisms. They are used at very low concentrations. What are different types? As there are innumerable antibiotics that are presently in use, different people classify them differently for e.g. those that kill or those just inhibit action of microorganisms, according to their chemical nature, according to types of organisms they kill, according to no of different types of microorganisms, their mechanism of action and so hence and so forth. Hence sulfadiazine and others are sulfonamides while isoniazid is nicotinic acid derivatives, etc. tetracyclines are bacteriostatic while vancomycin is bactericidal. How do they work? Some antibiotics for e.g. penicillins inhibit cell wall synthesis of bacteria, some like acyclovir inhibit DNA synthesis, some like sulfonamides interfere with metabolism and still others like tetracyclines inhibit protein synthesis. Similarly there are many others with different mechanism of action meant to be targeted at specific function of bacteria or virus. Is there any need for them?
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