January 2012

Dr. Deborah Norton is a champion for women, babies and neural tube defect (NTD) prevention. While pursuing her MPH in 1995, she became fascinated with the Folic Acid Campaign (originally known as the North Carolina Folic Acid Council). Dr. Norton, Women's Health Clinic Program Manager for Wake County Human Services, continues to be involved with the campaign by educating all of her patients, every day, about the importance of folic acid. 

“Taking one multivitamin [with folic acid] daily is such an easy step for women to take, and has such enormous benefit! It prevents a life-time of suffering for the child and the family,” said Norton. 

Taking a multivitamin is important for all women of childbearing age because it reduces their risk of having a pregnancy affected by a neural tube defect (NTD). If all women were to take 400 micrograms of folic acid every day, the amount found in most multivitamin supplements, then up to 70 percent of NTDs...