Radiological And Genetic Expression Of Neural Tube Defects

Background: Neural tube defects (NTDs) are the most common birth defects which mainly affect developingfoetuses, with a high incidence rate in India and main causes of it been nutritional deficiencies and geneticpredisposition. Folic acid supplementation brought decline in the incidence of NTDs.Materials: This study was conducted on 1000 dead foetuses in Anatomy department, over a period of two yearsfrom 2017- 2019 .The dead foetuses were brought from the gynaecology and obstetrics department. A properfamily history and obstetrics history was collected. The foetuses were embalmed and later studied for NTDs indetail.Conclusion: Comparing the results with the previous studies it is clearly evident that the incidence of NTDs havesignificantly reduced from 11.42/1000 births to 0.2 to 10/1000 births. In most of the previous studies NTDs hada female preponderance whereas in present study there is equal preponderance. In older studies, Spina bifidawas the most common NTDs followed by anencephaly. But in the present study it is the same. Incidence of NTDshas reduced due to various reasons like prenatal screening tests forfoetal anomalies and folic acidsupplementation.