Gastroschisis refers to babies born with oragans outside the body. Gastroschicis is one pof the frequently encountered congenical anomaliesin pediatric surgery. This condition happens about about 1 in every 2,000 births. Gastroschitis is a defect or hole in the abdominal wall that lets the abdominal contents protude outside the body. Theres no peritoneal covering over the intestines and other organs. The hole is usually very small, but the exposed contents can range from tomach to the rectum (almost of the large and small intestine and stomach can be invloved).


The abnoramality can be seen by ultra sound as early as 14 weeks of pregnancy. Most often (75% of the time) it occurs with the first born baby. The malformation is always obvious at birth. It is a very frightening experience for new parents , but, in most cases, the defect can be totally repaired and the baby will completely recover.

since the bowel is not contained inside the body, before birth, it floats in amniotic fluid. Contact with the amniotic fluid can cause severe damage. The bowel pcan fail to grow , become thickened , matted , or shortened with poor mucosal function. The damage becomes more severe with prolonged exposure to the amniotic fluid , specially after thirty-five weeks gestation , so some physicians suggest early Cesarean delivery to limit bowel damage. Sometimes the physician perform weekly ultra sound thirty weeks on to watch for bowel wall thickening and when thickening is observed he delivers the baby by cesarean delivery to limit bowel damge . There are many studies that claim there are no significant benefits of early cesarean delivery over viginal delivery at term.


Immediately after birth, any organs outside the baby's body are covered with warm , moist sterile bandages and then placed inside a special plasctic pouch . A nasogastric (NG) tube is placed in the baby's nose or mouth to keep the stomach empty and to prevent chocking on or breathing in any stomach contents.