What are the core symptoms of neural tube defects?

None: There are no symptoms in a pregnant woman if her baby has a neural tube defect. The blood test for maternal serum Alpha fetoprotein (msafp) is frequently elevated, if she has that testing done, but an ultrasound is necessary to diagnose a neural tube defect in the baby.

Interuption of spine: Neural tube defects occur in-utero during the development of the central nervous system during the first trimenster. It can occur at any level of the spine, most commonly it occurs at the bottom of the spine. The defect can be variable in size and amount of neuronal tissue that is exposed. Mostly it produced paralysis below that level, urinary and rectal incontinance.