Facial Congestion in the Newborn

It seems to be sometime since I updated my blog. Well for personal reasons I did not have much time to do just that. And one of the reason is, my wife just delivered a beautiful baby boy, and there's something on this baby that I would like to share for my blog today, that is facial congestion.

Some babies are born with their cord round the neck. This is something that rarely happen, but do happen at times as well. It is not the cord is around the baby's neck when the baby is in the mother's womb, but only happen when the baby is delivered. As the baby is delivered, the cord got round the baby's neck and when the baby comes out, it will be as if the baby got 'strangulated'. Well, i say 'as if', meaning, it appears to be strangulated. Not always.

When this happen, there will be some sign of congestion on the babies face and this can sometime be mistaken as 'petechiae' or red spot on the body. When a baby (or any human being for that fact) has got petechiae, it is abnormal and tells us few things.

1. the person got some capillaries problem, therefore leading to petechiae

2. severe viral infection (like dengue)

3. Congenital infection (TORCHES infection). 'Congenital' means, infection acquired from birth

4. Low platelets due to whatever reason.

My baby has got some red spots but at the same time the baby's face appear darker compared with the rest of the body. This is facial congestion. This may be due to the delivery process (which is very stressful to the baby also) or because of cord round neck.

Facial congestions disappear after few days. However, if it is not congestion, then the red dots are petechiaes and need to be checked out by a doctor.

The photo on the right is my baby's photo that show's some red dots and darker colour face.

So, the next time anyone of you face this problem, don't worry. It's not permanent.