Health is the best birthday present any parent could ask for their new baby. No wonder from time immemorial the first question at the moment of birth, asked in a look, a touch, or in words, has always been: 'Is my baby all right?' Most people know that good health begins before birth and that looking after mothers and their unborn babies during pregnancy is very important. But did you know that good health care can begin even before conception? It may seem strange to think that both men and women can help to give their baby a healthier start in life, even before life begins for their baby, but it is true.

A couple planning and looking forward to starting a family slowly begins to see the world around them in a different way. Pregnant women, babies in pushchairs and even advertisements for products like nappies and prams, which have been a hitherto unnoticed backdrop to a child-free life, suddenly come sharply into focus. But while the reality of a baby is still a day-dream, a young couple's thoughts tend to turn inwards and dwell most on how life will change for them. Women think about how pregnancy will change their bodies, and what the birth will be like. Both men and women wonder how becoming parents may change their relationships and way of life. It takes an effort of mind as well as the right supply of information to realise that how you live and look after your body now can matter to this child who exists only in your imagination. If you are reading this book before pregnancy has begun, you have an extra opportunity to try to stack the odds in favour of a head start in health for your future family.

Preconceptual care means both partners cutting known risks before trying to conceive, to make it as likely as possible that the egg and sperm which will grow into an embryo are healthy and normal, and also to create the best environment for that embryo to grow and develop into a fit baby.

Why Does Preconceptual Care Matter?

Your baby's first twelve weeks of life in the uterus, or womb, are the most critical in many respects. During this time all the essential organs are being formed and by three months most are beginning to work. However, the majority of women do not even suspect that they are pregnant until they miss a period, and even if they are very prompt in going to their GP and having their pregnancy confirmed they are unlikely to have their first antenatal appointment much before they are eight or nine weeks pregnant - and often much later than that.

If this seems a worrying thought take comfort in the fact that the vast majority of babies develop and grow safely and healthily. But what doctors have now discovered is that there are easy measures every couple can take which will reduce risks even further. The idea of trying to minimise risks to a baby even before he is conceived is relatively new, but it makes sense to avoid environmental factors which we now know can pose a hazard to the unborn baby and to follow simple guidelines which we know to be beneficial.

That is not to say that every unborn baby who is exposed to such factors will be damaged in some way. Like adults, some unborn babies are more susceptible or more vulnerable at certain times and in certain ways than others. There are babies who seem to have incurred only slight risks before birth yet, for reasons which may not be fully known, have sadly suffered some degree of damage. And there are babies who have been exposed to very many risks, sometimes considered serious, who have been born perfectly normal and healthy. In between babies born with a specific abnormality and babies born free of such damage there is a wide spectrum of varying shades of grey in terms of fitness and health. A baby who weighs less than 2,500 grams (5H lbs) at birth is classified as having a low birthweight. These small babies are more vulnerable in the early weeks and months of life and can take time to catch up with larger babies. We know that some environmental factors can often combine to prevent babies growing properly in the uterus, and that some of these factors can be avoided.