Glossary of Medical and Health Terms

Congenital Syphilis

Congenital syphilis is syphilis present in utero and at birth, and occurs when a child is born to a mother with secondary or tertiary syphilis. Untreated syphilis results in a high risk of a bad outcome of pregnancy, including Mulberry molars in the fetus. Syphilis can cause miscarriages, premature births, stillbirths, or death of newborn babies. Some infants with congenital syphilis have symptoms at birth, but most develop symptoms later. Untreated babies can have deformities, delays in development, or seizures along with many other problems such as rash, fever, swollen liver and spleen, anemia, and jaundice. Sores on infected babies are infectious. Rarely, the symptoms of syphilis go unseen in infants so that they develop the symptoms of late-stage syphilis, including damage to their bones, teeth, eyes, ears, and brain.

According to the CDC, 40% of births to syphilitic mothers are stillborn, 40-70% of the survivors will be infected, and 12% of these will subsequently die.

Early congenital syphilis

This is a subset of cases of congenital syphilis. Newborns may be asymptomatic and are only identified on routine prenatal screening. If not identified and treated, these newborns develop poor feeding and rhinorrhea. By definition, early congenital syphilis occurs in children between 0 and 2 years old. After, they can develop late congenital syphilis.

Symptomatic newborns, if not stillborn, are born premature, with enlargement of the liver, spleen, skeletal abnormalities, pneumonia and a bullous skin disease known as pemphigus syphiliticus.

Associated ICD-10 code: A50.0.

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Congenital_syphilis

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