Evidence of human birth defects dating back over three thousand years is reported in archeological literature. Excavated ruins of ancient Babylon revealed detailed reports of infant defects.1 Achondroplastic dwarfs (failure to develop healthy cartilage at the ends of the long bones, resulting in a form of congenital dwarfism) have been unearthed in ancient Egyptian tombs. Pictures drawn on anci...

BACKGROUND Few studies on cluster-based synthetic effects of multiple risk factors for birth defects have been reported. The present study aimed to identify maternal exposure clusters, explore the association between clusters of risk factors and birth defects, and further screen women with high risk for birth defects among expectant mothers. METHODS Data were drawn from a large-scale, retrosp...

Birth defects are the leading cause of infant death in the United States and among the top causes of pediatric death and hospitalization. Despite the devastating impact of birth defects, we understand little of their etiology impeding progress towards treatment and prevention. Moreover, while surgical interventions have improved survival for many children to beyond their first year, our inabili...

BACKGROUND Few studies have been conducted on long-term survival of children with major birth defects because of a lack of longitudinal birth defects surveillance data. The objective of this study was to conduct a 25-year survival analysis among children in New York born with major defects by survival age, birth defect category, and other possible contributing factors. METHODS A cohort was co...

BACKGROUND Completeness of case ascertainment is a concern for all birth defects registries and generally requires a multisource approach. Using infant death certificates as one case ascertainment source may identify cases of birth defects that would have otherwise been missed. We sought to examine the utility of adding infant death certificates to the Florida Birth Defect Registry's (FBDR) cas...