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Developmental disabilities are severe, long-term problems. They may be physical, such as blindness. They may affect mental ability, such as learning disabilities. Or the problem can be both physical and mental, such as Down syndrome. The problems are usually life-long, and can affect everyday living.

There are many causes of developmental disabilities, including:

• Genetic or chromosome abnormalities. These cause conditions such as Down syndrome and Rett syndrome.
• Prenatal exposure to substances. For example, drinking alcohol when pregnant can cause fetal alcohol spectrum disorders.
• Certain infections in pregnancy
• Preterm birth

Often there is no cure, but treatment can help the symptoms. Treatments include physical, speech, and occupational therapy. Special education classes and psychological counseling can also help.

NIH: National Institute of Child Health and Human Development

Genes are the building blocks of heredity. They are passed from parent to child. They hold DNA, the instructions for making proteins. Proteins do most of the work in cells. They move molecules from one place to another, build structures, break down toxins, and do many other maintenance jobs.

Sometimes there is a mutation, a change in a gene or genes. The mutation changes the gene's instructions for making a protein, so the protein does not work properly or is missing entirely. This can cause a medical condition called a genetic disorder.

You can inherit a gene mutation from one or both parents. A mutation can also happen during your lifetime.

There are three types of genetic disorders:

• Single-gene disorders, where a mutation affects one gene. Sickle cell anemia is an example.
• Chromosomal disorders, where chromosomes (or parts of chromosomes) are missing or changed. Chromosomes are the structures that hold our genes. Down syndrome is a chromosomal disorder.
• Complex disorders, where there are mutations in two or more genes. Often your lifestyle and environment also play a role. Colon cancer is an example.

Genetic tests on blood and other tissue can identify genetic disorders.

NIH: National Library of Medicine

A birth defect is a problem that happens while a baby is developing in the mother's body. Most birth defects happen during the first 3 months of pregnancy. One out of every 33 babies in the United States is born with a birth defect.

A birth defect may affect how the body looks, works, or both. Some birth defects like cleft lip or neural tube defects are structural problems that can be easy to see. Others, like heart disease, are found using special tests. Birth defects can range from mild to severe. How a birth defect affects a child's life depends mostly on which organ or body part is involved and how severe the defect is.

For some birth defects, researchers know the cause. But for many birth defects, the exact cause is unknown. Researchers think that most birth defects are caused by a complex mix of factors, which can include:

• Genetics. One or more genes might have a change or mutation that prevents them from working properly. For example, this happens in Fragile X syndrome. With some defects, a gene or part of the gene might be missing.
• Chromosomal problems. In some cases, a chromosome or part of a chromosome might be missing. This is what happens in Turner syndrome. In other cases, such as with Down syndrome, the child has an extra chromosome.
• Exposures to medicines, chemicals, or other toxic substances. For example, alcohol misuse can cause fetal alcohol spectrum disorders.
• Infections during pregnancy. For example, infection with Zika virus during pregnancy can cause a serious defect in the brain.
• Lack of certain nutrients. Not getting enough folic acid before and during pregnancy is a key factor in causing neural tube defects.

Certain factors may increase the chances of having a baby with a birth defect, such as:

• Smoking, drinking alcohol, or taking certain "street" drugs during pregnancy
• Having certain medical conditions, such as obesity or uncontrolled diabetes, before and during pregnancy
• Taking certain medicines
• Having someone in your family with a birth defect. To learn more about your risk of having a baby with a birth defect, you can talk with a genetic counselor,
• Being an older mother, typically over the age of 34 years

Health care providers can diagnose some birth defects during pregnancy, using prenatal testing. That's why it important to get regular prenatal care.

Other birth defects may not be found until after the baby is born. Providers may find them through newborn screening. Some defects, such as club foot, are obvious right away. Other times, the health care provider may not discover a defect until later in life, when the child has symptoms.

Children with birth defects often need special care and treatments. Because the symptoms and problems caused by birth defects vary, the treatments also vary. Possible treatments may include surgery, medicines, assistive devices, physical therapy, and speech therapy.

Often, children with birth defects need a variety of services and may need to see several specialists. The primary health care provider can coordinate the special care that the child needs.

Not all birth defects can be prevented. But there are things you can do before and during pregnancy to increase your chance of having a healthy baby:

• Start prenatal care as soon as you think you might be pregnant, and see your health care provider regularly during pregnancy
• Get 400 micrograms (mcg) of folic acid every day. If possible, you should start taking it at least one month before you get pregnant.
• Don't drink alcohol, smoke, or use "street" drugs
• Talk to your health care provider about any medicines you are taking or thinking about taking. This includes prescription and over-the-counter medicines, as well as dietary or herbal supplements.
• Learn how to prevent infections during pregnancy
• If you have any medical conditions, try to get them under control before you get pregnant

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

Celiac disease is a chronic (long-term) digestive and immune disorder that damages your small intestine. The damage may prevent your body from absorbing vitamins, minerals, and other nutrients from the food you eat. This can lead to malnutrition and other serious health problems

Celiac disease is triggered by eating foods that contain gluten. Gluten is a protein found in wheat, barley, rye, and other grains. It may also be in other products like vitamins and supplements, hair and skin products, toothpastes, and lip balm.

Celiac disease is different from gluten sensitivity. Both involve problems with gluten and can cause some of the same symptoms, such as abdominal (belly) pain and fatigue. But gluten sensitivity does not damage the small intestine like celiac disease does.

Wheat allergy, a type of food allergy, is also different. With both celiac disease and wheat allergy, your immune system is reacting to wheat. But with wheat allergy, you can have some different symptoms, such as itchy eyes or trouble breathing. And a wheat allergy will not cause long-term damage to the small intestine.

The exact cause of celiac disease is not known. Research suggests that celiac disease only happens in people who have certain genes and eat food that contains gluten. Researchers are studying other factors that may play a role in causing the disease.

Celiac disease is more common if you:

• Have a family member who has the disease
• Have Down syndrome, Turner syndrome, or Williams syndrome
• Are White
• Are female

The symptoms of celiac disease can be different from person to person. Sometimes the symptoms may come and go. Some people may not notice any symptoms.

Some of the possible symptoms affect your digestive system. Digestive symptoms are more common in children than in adults. The digestive symptoms include:

• Bloating (feeling fullness or swelling in your belly)
• Chronic (long-term) diarrhea or greasy, bulky, unusually bad-smelling stool (poop)
• Constipation
• Gas
• Lactose intolerance because of damage to the small intestine
• Nausea and vomiting
• Pain in the abdomen (belly)
• Weight loss in adults, or not enough weight gain in children

Some people with celiac disease have symptoms that affect other parts of the body, such as:

• Fatigue
• Depression and anxiety
• Irritability (in children)
• Dermatitis herpetiformis, an itchy rash with blisters (mainly in adults)
• Bone or joint pain
• Symptoms involving the mouth, such as canker sores or dry mouth

Over time, celiac disease can cause other health problems, especially if it is not treated. These problems can include:

• Malnutrition
• Anemia, especially iron-deficiency anemia
• Bone loss
• Nervous system problems such as headaches, balance problems, or peripheral neuropathy
• Reproductive problems, such as missed menstrual periods and miscarriages in women and infertility in men and women

If you have symptoms of celiac disease, your health care provider will look for signs that you might have celiac disease. To do this, your provider will get your medical and family history and do a physical exam.

If your provider thinks that you could have celiac disease, you will have some tests. Providers most often use blood tests and biopsies of the small intestine to diagnose celiac disease. The biopsy would be done during an upper gastrointestinal (GI) endoscopy. For this procedure, your provider uses an endoscope (a flexible tube with a camera) to see the lining of your esophagus, stomach, and small intestine. It also allows your provider to take a sample of tissue for a biopsy.

The treatment for celiac disease is following a gluten-free diet for the rest of your life. Sticking with a gluten-free diet will treat or prevent many of the symptoms and other health problems caused by celiac disease. In most cases, it can also heal damage in the small intestine and prevent more damage.

Your provider may refer you to a registered dietician (a nutrition expert) who can help you learn how to eat a healthy diet without gluten. You will also need to avoid all hidden sources of gluten, such as certain supplements, cosmetics, toothpaste, etc. Reading product labels can sometimes help you avoid gluten. If a label doesn't tell you what is in a product, check with the company that makes the product for an ingredients list. Don't just assume that a product is gluten-free if it doesn't mention it.

NIH: National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases

Congenital heart defects (CHDs) are problems with the structure of the heart. "Congenital" means that that the problems are present at birth. These defects happen when a baby's heart doesn't develop normally during pregnancy. Congenital heart defects are the most common type of birth defect.

Congenital heart defects can change the way the heart pumps blood. They may make blood flow too slowly, go the wrong way, or block it completely.

There are many types of congenital heart defects. They can happen in one or more parts of the heart. The most common types are:

• Septal defects ("hole in the heart") - openings in the wall between the left and right sides of the heart
• Heart valve defects - problems with the valves that control the flow of blood through the heart
• Defects in the large blood vessels that carry blood in and out of the heart

Congenital heart defects can range from very mild problems that never need treatment to life-threatening problems at birth. The most serious congenital heart defects are called critical congenital heart disease. Babies with these defects usually need surgery in the first year of life. But the symptoms of milder heart defects may not show up until childhood or adulthood.

Researchers often don't know what causes congenital heart defects. They do know that changes in a baby's genes sometimes cause a heart defect. The changed genes may come from the parents, or the changes may happen during pregnancy.

Several things may increase the chance that your baby has a congenital heart defect, such as:

• Your health before and during pregnancy, including
  • Having diabetes before pregnancy or developing it in the first 3 months of pregnancy (diabetes that develops later in pregnancy isn't a major risk for heart defects). Carefully controlling your blood sugar before and during pregnancy can lower your baby's risk of congenital heart defects.
  • Having phenylketonuria (PKU), a rare inherited disorder that affects how the body uses a protein in foods. If you have PKU, eating a low-protein diet before getting pregnant can lower your baby's risk of having a congenital heart defect.
  • Having rubella (German measles) during pregnancy.
• Your contact with certain substances during pregnancy, including
  • Smoking or secondhand smoke (breathing smoke from another smoker).
  • Certain medicines, such as angiotensin-converting (ACE) inhibitors for high blood pressure and retinoic acids for acne. If you're pregnant or plan to get pregnant, talk with your health care provider about all the medicines you take.
• Your family history and genetics. In most cases, congenital heart defects don't run in families. But your chance of having a baby with a congenital heart defect does go up if you or the other parent has a congenital heart defect, or if you already have a child with a congenital heart defect.

Congenital heart defects don't cause pain. The signs and symptoms are different, depending on the type and number of defects and how serious they are.

Common signs and symptoms of congenital heart defects include:

• Cyanosis - a bluish color to the skin, lips, and fingernails. It happens when there isn't enough oxygen in the blood
• Fatigue - your baby may be unusually sleepy and may become very tired during feedings
• Poor blood flow
• Fast or difficult breathing
• Heart murmur - an unusual sound between heartbeats

Congenital heart defects don't always cause other problems. If they do, which problems you have would depend on the type and number of defects and how serious the defects are.

Children with congenital heart defects are more likely to:

• Be smaller than other children
• Have problems or delays in mental, and emotional growth, and behavior, such as:
  • Speech and language problems
  • Attention deficit hyperactivity disorders (ADHD)

People with congenital heart defects may develop other health conditions, including:

• Endocarditis - an infection of lining of the heart and valves
• Arrhythmia - a problem with the rate or rhythm of your heartbeat
• Heart failure - when your heart can't pump enough blood to the body
• Pulmonary hypertension - high blood pressure in your lungs
• Kidney and liver disease

• Before a baby is born, your provider may use ultrasound pictures of the baby's heart to look for heart defects. This is called a fetal echocardiogram. It's done between weeks 18 and 22 of pregnancy.
• During the first few days after birth, all newborns are checked for congenital heart defects. A pulse oximeter is clipped to your baby's hands or feet to measure blood oxygen. If it shows low levels of blood oxygen, more tests will be needed to find out if your baby has a heart defect.
• To diagnose congenital heart defects in babies, children, and adults, a provider may use many tools, including:
  • A physical exam.
  • Certain heart tests to see how the heart is working.
  • Genetic testing to see if certain gene problems caused the defect.

Treatment depends on the type of congenital heart defect and how serious it is. Possible treatments include:

• Cardiac catheterization to repair simple defects, such as a small hole in the inside wall of the heart. A catheterization uses a thin tube guided through a vein and into the heart.
• Heart surgery may be needed to:
  • Repair defects in the heart and blood vessels.
  • Repair or replace a heart valve.
  • Place a device in the chest to help the heart pump blood.
  • Do a heart transplant.
• Medicine is often used if your baby has a specific type of congenital heart defect called patent ductus arteriosus.

All children and adults who have congenital heart defects need regular follow-up care from a cardiologist (a doctor who specializes in heart diseases) throughout their life, even if their defect was repaired.

Some people may need several heart surgeries or catheterizations over the years. They may also need to take medicines to help their hearts work as well as possible.

NIH: National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute

Heart disease is a general term that includes many types of heart problems. It's also called cardiovascular disease, which means heart and blood vessel disease.

Heart disease is the leading cause of death in the United States, but there are ways to prevent and manage many types of heart disease.

There are many different types of heart disease. Some you may be born with, called congenital heart disease. Other types develop during your lifetime.

Coronary artery disease (also called coronary heart disease) is the most common type of heart disease. It happens slowly over time when a sticky substance called plaque builds up in the arteries that supply your heart muscle with blood. The plaque narrows or blocks blood flow to the heart muscle and can lead to other heart problems:

• Angina - chest pain from lack of blood flow
• Heart attacks - when part of the heart muscle dies from loss of blood flow
• Heart failure - when your heart can't pump enough blood to meet your body's needs
• Arrhythmia - a problem with the rate or rhythm of your heartbeat

Other types of heart diseases may affect your heart valves or heart muscle (cardiomyopathy).

The causes of heart disease depend on the type of disease. Some possible causes include lifestyle, genetics, infections, medicines, and other diseases.

There are many different factors that can make you more likely to develop heart disease. Some of these factors you can change, but others you cannot.

• Age. Your risk of heart disease goes up as you get older.
• Sex. Some factors may affect heart disease risk differently in women than in men.
• Family history and genetics. A family history of early heart disease raises your risk of heart disease. And research has shown that some genes are linked to a higher risk of certain heart diseases.
• Race/ethnicity. Certain groups have higher risks than others.
• Lifestyle habits. Over time, unhealthy lifestyle habits can raise your risk heart disease:
  • Eating a diet high in saturated fats, refined carbohydrates, and salt.
  • Not getting enough physical activity.
  • Drinking too much alcohol.
  • Smoking and exposure to secondhand smoke.
  • Too much stress.
• Having other medical conditions can raise your risk of heart diseases. These conditions include:
  • High blood pressure.
  • High cholesterol levels.
  • Diabetes.
  • Obesity.
  • Autoimmune and inflammatory diseases.
  • Chronic kidney disease.
  • Metabolic syndrome.

Your symptoms will depend on the type of heart disease you have. You may not have symptoms at first. In some cases, you may not know you have heart disease until you have a complication such as a heart attack.

To find out if you have heart disease, your health care provider will:

• Ask about your medical history, including your symptoms
• Ask about your family health history, including relatives who have had heart disease
• Do a physical exam
• Likely run heart tests and blood tests

In some cases, your provider may refer you to a cardiologist (a doctor who specializes in heart diseases) for tests, diagnosis, and care.

Treatment plans for heart disease depend on the type of heart disease you have, how serious your symptoms are, and what other health conditions you have. Possible treatments may include:

• Heart-healthy lifestyle changes
• Medicines
• Procedures or surgeries
• Cardiac rehabilitation

You may be able to lower your risk of certain heart diseases by making heart-healthy lifestyle changes and managing any other medical conditions you have.

NIH: National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute