Pregnancy, Child Birth | featured news

“For the first time we can clearly see the mechanics of a vaginal delivery,” he said. “For years, obstetricians have relied on very crude methods of understanding complications like cephalopelvic disproportion (CPD), which translates when the baby fails to descend into the birth canal and there is a rest in cervical dilatation, which ultimately leads to a C-section.”

Singer Celine Dion, 42, gave birth Saturday to premature twin boys.

As their due date creeps closer, many pregnant women pack a go bag for the hospital: toothbrush, iPod, cute bringing-baby-home outfit. But in recent months, savvy mothers-to-be have started tucking in one more important item: a kit to collect and donate the blood in their babies' umbilical cord.

Doctors could one day use a blood test to predict decades in advance when women will go into menopause, scientists say. In research to be presented on Monday at a European fertility conference in Rome, Iranian experts say their preliminary study could be a first step toward developing a tool to help women decide when they want to have children.

For most pregnant women, exercise is the last thing on their minds. After all, keeping slim while you're expecting isn't exactly the top priority — rather, it's making sure your baby gets enough nutrients to grow. But in a small new study, researchers at the University of Auckland in New Zealand report that a mother's regular aerobic exercise may be good for a growing fetus' health — and may even help a baby get a healthier start in life.

Nearly one in three children in the United States is born by Caesarean section.

More than 30 years after the world greeted its first "test-tube" baby with a mixture of awe, elation and concern, researchers say they are finding only a few medical differences between these children and kids conceived in the traditional way....

How a Virginia family got permission to get out-of-network treatment for one son's heart defect, and still ended up drowning in debt.

A Chilean weightlifter gives birth to a baby boy during a training session, without having known she was pregnant.

In the next two weeks, Shannon and Paul Morell will meet their baby boy for the first time after the woman who was wrongly implanted with their frozen embryo gives birth. "This has been a terrible thing that has happened to two good families, but we’re doing the best we can for the health of this baby," Shannon Morell said.