Dorothea Eicher, M.D., one of three MUSC neonatologists on the study team, explained that there are any number of reasons oxygen is cut off to cells in the brain. In many cases, an infant's placenta is torn from the uterus wall in birth. Sometimes the umbilical cord becomes tangled. These infants have a 60 to 100 percent chance of dying. Other causes of asphyxia are brain injury, cerebral palsy, mental retardation, seizures, speech and hearing problems, or other mental disability.
Parents expect no problems.
The pregnancy is normal and full-term, and then suddenly there's injury to the brain. It's devastating, Eicher said. Research into the molecular and cellular mechanisms of cell death from asphyxia indicates a core of neurons dies quickly. But many more of these brain cells struggle for days and weeks after. It's this secondary cell death, called apoptosis, that Eicher and the study team hope to prevent.