In this new year, health officials are trying to get Iowans to make a fresh start for themselves and their potential offspring. The chief of the Iowa Birth Defects Registry says mothers and women who someday want to become mothers need to learn to take care of themselves first.Dr. Paul Romitti is director of the registry, which is located in the University of Iowa’s College of Public Health. He says folic acid is a vital part of helping to prevent birth defects.Dr. Romitti says his office is tracking the number of birth defects reported every year in Iowa and hopes to cut the cases through education, since many birth defects are preventable.Iowa sees about 16-hundred babies born with defects every year or 150-thousand nationwide. January is National Birth Defects Prevention Month.
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