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• 12 / 22 / 2008

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The treatment consists on using a special diaper provided with a rubber accessory with which the baby's deformity can be fixed in three to four weeks, according to experts who have said such a condition affects all babies born at nine months.

Carried out in the easternmost Cuban province, the study shows that the mothers-to-be release certain hormones in delivery that make their hips wider and facilitate the birth. Those hormones reach the fetus through the umbilical cord and cause the dysplasia, which is an abnormality in the maturation of cells within a tissue.

From 15 to 35 babies with the deformity go unnoticed, said Armando Zamora, Ortho-prosthesis technician and leader of the study, that has been supported by the Science, Technology and Environment Ministry and the Clinical Trials Department of Guantanamo's Medical School.

Zamora, who is also head of the Health Technology Department at Guantanamo's Medical School, said that with the collaboration of local families and the primary health care system in the province, the prophylactic diaper is expected to be used on 1,000 children, 300 of them from the mountain communities.

The expert assured that fixing the deformity within the first three years of age would avoid further surgery.

Other projects carried out by the team include an ortho-therapeutic snail, which is a sort of labyrinth with tunnels, slopes, and irregular steps, all of them designed to make babies walk on them motivated by games with the objective of improving their locomotive system.

(RHC)