Parents should take their infants to a doctor if the children have jaundice for more than 14 days and have chalky gray or pale yellow stool, the Taiwan Children Liver Foundation said.
The foundation cited a recent case in which a girl, born in Taipei’s Cardinal Tien Hospital in June, was found to have jaundice four days after birth, but her condition worsened after receiving phototherapy, and blood tests showed that her total bilirubin and direct bilirubin levels were high.
She was transferred to National Taiwan University Hospital for further examination and was diagnosed with biliary atresia — a life-threatening condition in infants in which the bile ducts inside or outside the liver do not have openings. It must be corrected by surgery.
“Prevalence of biliary atresia in Taiwan is probably the second-highest in the world,” Foundation chairperson Chang Mei-hwei (張美惠) said. “An average of about 1.5 to two per 10,000 newborns in Taiwan have biliary atresia.”
She said that the prevalence of the condition in newborns in Western nations is about 0.5 to 0.7 per 10,000 people, and about 0.8 to 0.9 per 10,000 people in Japan.
Jaundice is one of the symptoms of biliary atresia, Chang said, adding that parents should take their babies to a doctor if they see signs of jaundice.
About 30 to 40 infants are diagnosed with biliary atresia in Taiwan every year, and it is the most common cause of liver transplants in children or infant deaths caused by liver disease, she said, adding that early detection is important for treatment, but about 30 percent of cases are not discovered at an early stage.
The foundation said parents can use the infant stool color card in the Children’s Health Manual published by the Health Promotion Administration to check whether their infant’s stool color is normal.
Taiwan would welcome the return of Honduras as a diplomatic ally if its next president decides to make such a move, Minister of Foreign Affairs Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) said yesterday. “Of course, we would welcome Honduras if they want to restore diplomatic ties with Taiwan after their elections,” Lin said at a meeting of the legislature’s Foreign Affairs and National Defense Committee, when asked to comment on statements made by two of the three Honduran presidential candidates during the presidential campaign in the Central American country. Taiwan is paying close attention to the region as a whole in the wake of a
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairman Eric Chu (朱立倫), spokeswoman Yang Chih-yu (楊智伃) and Legislator Hsieh Lung-chieh (謝龍介) would be summoned by police for questioning for leading an illegal assembly on Thursday evening last week, Minister of the Interior Liu Shyh-fang (劉世芳) said today. The three KMT officials led an assembly outside the Taipei City Prosecutors’ Office, a restricted area where public assembly is not allowed, protesting the questioning of several KMT staff and searches of KMT headquarters and offices in a recall petition forgery case. Chu, Yang and Hsieh are all suspected of contravening the Assembly and Parade Act (集會遊行法) by holding
PRAISE: Japanese visitor Takashi Kubota said the Taiwanese temple architecture images showcased in the AI Art Gallery were the most impressive displays he saw Taiwan does not have an official pavilion at the World Expo in Osaka, Japan, because of its diplomatic predicament, but the government-backed Tech World pavilion is drawing interest with its unique recreations of works by Taiwanese artists. The pavilion features an artificial intelligence (AI)-based art gallery showcasing works of famous Taiwanese artists from the Japanese colonial period using innovative technologies. Among its main simulated displays are Eastern gouache paintings by Chen Chin (陳進), Lin Yu-shan (林玉山) and Kuo Hsueh-hu (郭雪湖), who were the three young Taiwanese painters selected for the East Asian Painting exhibition in 1927. Gouache is a water-based
President William Lai (賴清德) has appointed former vice president Chen Chien-jen (陳建仁) to attend the late Pope Francis’ funeral at the Vatican City on Saturday on his behalf, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said today. The Holy See announced Francis’ funeral would take place on Saturday at 10am in St Peter’s Square. The ministry expressed condolences over Francis’ passing and said that Chen would represent Taiwan at the funeral and offer condolences in person. Taiwan and the Vatican have a long-standing and close diplomatic relationship, the ministry said. Both sides agreed to have Chen represent Taiwan at the funeral, given his Catholic identity and
RSS