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NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Women pregnant with twins should be sure to gain the recommended amount of weight, according to a new study, which shows that gaining less weight than recommended during a twin pregnancy ups the risk of early birth and low weight babies. "A woman should gain about a pound a week; less than that, and we had ...

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - If babies are born a couple of weeks early, but are healthy, they're not at greater risk of developmental or behavior problems later on, new research shows. But babies born at 34 to 36 weeks' pregnancy who have problems such as difficulty breathing or eating, the study's authors say, may still be at a ...

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Women who were born prematurely or had siblings who were may be at increased risk of having a preterm baby themselves, a large UK study finds. The findings, from a study of nearly 14,000 women who gave birth between the 1970s and 2008, add to evidence that genes are involved in the risk of preterm ...

The first thing Dr. Marta Valcarcel notices on a walk through a nursery full of tiny, heavily bandaged babies is the empty incubator in the corner. She calls out to a nurse who only shakes her head. The infant who came in days earlier weighing less than 3 1/2 pounds had succumbed to illness — another child born too early ...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. rate of pre-term births has fallen for the second year in a row, U.S. researchers reported on Tuesday. The findings are good news, as babies born too early and too small are sicker and more likely to die than babies born after a full 39 weeks of gestation. But pre-term birth rates remain high ...

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Stressful situations in early pregnancy can lead to the birth of babies who are underweight or born too early, new research from China shows. Timing of the stress, the researchers found, was the key. "The findings are modest, but significant," the authors write in the American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology. The risks of premature births ...

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Over the past 15 years, survival rates among infants born extremely early (before 24 weeks of pregnancy) have not improved, but it's not for lack of trying. According to a UK study released today, there has been an increase in the number of extremely preterm babies receiving active, yet ultimately unsuccessful, treatment. These tiny babies ...

U.S. births fell in 2008, probably because of the recession, updated government figures confirm. The one exception to the trend was the birth rate among women in their 40s, who perhaps felt they didn't have the luxury of waiting for better economic times. The birth rate for women in their early 40s rose a surprising 4 percent over ...

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Babies born by in vitro fertilization (IVF) do not face an increased risk of birth defects, nor are they at greater risk of being smaller than normal, according to a study conducted in Japan. But the researchers did find that women pregnant via IVF were more likely than those who conceived naturally to develop a pregnancy ...

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Overall, very premature twins fare just as well as single babies born very early, and they may even face a lower risk of certain complications, new research shows. But for twin pairs of the same sex but sharply different sizes who are born before 28 weeks, the risks of death and bleeding on the brain are ...