A Journey Through Birth Defects: From Trainee to Pediatrician’s Perspective
Published in Biomedical Research and Public Health
Many years ago, during my honorary training in neonatology, I encountered newborns with various types of birth defects, many of which I was seeing for the first time. Unfortunately, many of these babies did not survive. During this period, I became familiar with terms such as malformation, deformation, and disruption, and my curiosity about congenital anomalies grew.
At that time, I had a mobile phone with a camera whose resolution was not very good—much like my level of training at that early stage of my career. Nevertheless, I started documenting the cases I encountered. By the end of my three-month training period, I had collected enough material to prepare a presentation on the congenital anomalies I had seen during that time.
My teachers appreciated my effort to collect local data, and that moment marked the beginning of my journey into the field of birth defects.
The irony is that, many years later, the fate of many children born with birth defects remains unchanged for various reasons, including limited awareness, delayed diagnosis, and inadequate access to specialized care. It is high time that we strengthen our efforts to prevent birth defects, improve early detection, and ensure better care for affected children and their families.
I am a pediatrician working in Bangladesh. Hard work is my passion, whether or not I directly benefit from it. I find satisfaction in the process itself and remain committed to it. My aim is to bridge clinical practice and research to improve the care of neonates and children. I am particularly interested in research on birth defects, child abandonment, and other public health issues affecting children.
Follow the Topic
-
BMC Pregnancy and Childbirth
This is an open access, peer-reviewed journal that considers articles on all aspects of pregnancy and childbirth. It welcomes submissions on the biomedical aspects of pregnancy, breastfeeding, labor, maternal health, maternity care, trends and sociological aspects of pregnancy and childbirth.
Related Collections
With Collections, you can get published faster and increase your visibility.
Innovations in successful pregnancies for patients with polyendocrine metabolic ovarian syndrome
BMC Pregnancy and Childbirth is calling for submissions to our Collection on Innovations in successful pregnancies for patients with polyendocrine metabolic ovarian syndrome.
Polyendocrine Metabolic Ovarian Syndrome (PMOS) is a prevalent endocrine disorder that affects a significant proportion of women of reproductive age and is associated with various reproductive and metabolic challenges. Women with PMOS are predisposed to difficulties in achieving and maintaining pregnancy due to factors such as hormonal imbalances, insulin resistance, and associated comorbidities. Recent advances in assisted reproduction technologies, lifestyle interventions, and personalized medicine have shown promise in improving obstetric outcomes and perinatal health for women with PMOS. Understanding the clinical strategies used to manage PMOS for maternal and fetal health is crucial for developing targeted strategies that enhance pregnancy outcomes.
The Collection invites researchers and clinicians in fields including obstetrics, maternal-fetal medicine, midwifery, endocrinology, neonatology, and gynecology to contribute research that explores topics including, but not limited to, evaluations of clinical practices for managing maternal PMOS, long-term health implications for both mothers and their offspring, the role of epigenetics in PMOS, innovative approaches to regulating insulin resistance, and the effectiveness of integrative medicine practices in improving reproductive health.
All manuscripts submitted to this journal, including those submitted to collections and special issues, are assessed in line with our editorial policies and the journal’s peer review process. Reviewers and editors are required to declare competing interests and can be excluded from the peer review process if a competing interest exists.
Publishing Model: Open Access
Deadline: Sep 30, 2026
Non-obstetric emergency surgery in pregnant patients
Non-obstetric surgery in pregnant patients presents unique challenges and considerations that are often not well understood within the healthcare community. As pregnancy can complicate both the diagnosis and management of surgical conditions, understanding the implications of various surgical interventions on maternal and fetal outcomes is crucial. Improved understanding of the physiological changes during pregnancy has led to better risk assessment and management strategies, ultimately supporting more informed decision-making. Continued research can provide more robust, individualized care allowing for more nuanced approaches when addressing the needs of pregnant patients facing surgical interventions.
The Collection invites researchers and clinicians in fields including maternal-fetal medicine, obstetrics, orthopedics, and anesthesiology to contribute research that explores topics including, but not limited to, the management of non-obstetrical surgical emergencies, including appendicitis and cholecystitis, and the safety of anesthesia during pregnancy.
This Collection supports and amplifies research related to SDG 3: Good Health & Well-Being & SDG 5: Gender Equality.
All manuscripts submitted to this journal, including those submitted to collections and special issues, are assessed in line with our editorial policies and the journal’s peer review process. Reviewers and editors are required to declare competing interests and can be excluded from the peer review process if a competing interest exists.
Publishing Model: Open Access
Deadline: Oct 27, 2026
Please sign in or register for FREE
If you are a registered user on Research Communities by Springer Nature, please sign in
Thank you for raising this important issue and for sharing such a personal and formative clinical experience.
This topic is also very close to my own professional path. My PhD research was devoted to the frequency of congenital anomalies among live births in Ukraine, and it served as a pilot study for the implementation of a Genetic Monitoring Programme. That programme no longer operates in its original form, but the work done during that period became part of a much longer and very difficult path toward systematic early detection of hereditary and congenital conditions.
In Ukraine, this path has taken almost two decades and has contributed to the development of neonatal screening and prenatal testing/diagnostic approaches aimed at earlier diagnosis, timely treatment, and prevention where possible. It was not a quick or simple process, and your post is an important reminder that behind every public health programme there are years of clinical observation, local data collection, advocacy, and persistence.
I fully agree that we still need stronger awareness, earlier diagnosis, better referral pathways, and more accessible specialized care for children with birth defects and their families.
Thank you very much for sharing your remarkable journey and for highlighting the long-term efforts required to establish a sustainable system for congenital anomaly surveillance and early diagnosis.
I look forward to exploring your work to gain knowledge and insights from the European experience in establishing genetic monitoring and birth defect surveillance systems. In Bangladesh, we are still far from developing a national birth defects registry; however, your experience provides valuable lessons and inspiration. I sincerely hope that, with sustained efforts in research, advocacy, and policy development, we will one day be able to establish such a system in our country.
Your emphasis on consistent documentation is especially important. Without reliable registration and monitoring, birth defects remain visible mainly as individual clinical tragedies, but not as a measurable public health burden.