Premature birth is on the rise globally and doctors are not sure how to remedy early labor. The March of Dimes issued a global report Sunday on premature births and the statistics reveal 12.9 million infants are born before 37 weeks of development. That equals nearly 10 percent of the annual worldwide birth total.

The huge, but not record-setting 19 pound Indonesian baby (19 pounds, 2 ounces, to be exact) now has a name: Akbar Risuddin, or "the Great" in Arabic. Ani, his mother from Jakarta, Indonesia, delivered the 2-foot-long baby boy on Monday via C-section.

It would seem to be impossible, but doctors have told Todd and Julia Grovenburg from Arkansas that yes, she is a pregnant woman who is pregnant again. This is not a case of twins; the second fetus was conceived 2 1/2 weeks after the first.

It was a concern during my wife's pregnancy: don't get gestational diabetes because then the baby will be really large. While she never got that issue, a new study indicates that exercise during pregnancy helps keep newborn size normal.

A new report from the American Psychiatric Association (APA) and the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, which is published by Elsevier in the September-October 2009 issue of General Hospital Psychiatry explores the management of pregnancy and depression.

Think Octomom, Nadya Suleman had an amazing number of babies? A Tunisian woman in her 30s is expecting 12 babies after a ferility treatment. However, doctors have warned there is only a tiny chance that any of them will survive.

"Honestly, the technology got rolled out before we knew if it worked or not." That is a recent quote from an obstetrician in St. Louis. It illustrates a problem that pervades medicine today. Powerful technology and drugs are rushed to market without fully understanding their effect. That's resulted in not only high-profile drug recalls, but also quiet failures.

I saw the movie "The Man with Two Brains," but this is a real-life case of a rarity: a woman with two wombs. Lindsay Hasaj is that woman and she managed to give birth successfully, despite the condition.

Survivors of childhood cancer run particular risks when pregnant and should be closely monitored, the 25th annual conference of the European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology heard.

A major new trial recently published in the journal Fertility and Sterility shows that for couples beginning infertility treatments, an accelerated path to in-vitro fertilization (IVF) can offer a shorter time to pregnancy, cost savings of nearly $10,000, and a lowered risk of multiple births.

When mothers become infected with influenza during their pregnancy, it may increase the risk for schizophrenia in their offspring. Influenza is a very common virus and so there has been substantial concern about this association. A new study in the June 15th issue of Biological Psychiatry, published by Elsevier suggests that the observed association depends upon a pre-existing vulnerability in the fetus.