Maternity Information Pack - Rotunda Hospital

General good food hygiene practices
• Wash your hands before and after handling any food.
• Thoroughly wash all fruit and vegetables, including ready-prepared salads
before eating them.
• Cook raw meat and poultry thoroughly. Make sure that you properly reheat
ready-to-eat poultry and cooked chilled meals and they are piping hot
before you eat them.
• Always wash your hands after handling raw meat or poultry and make sure
that you store raw foods separately from ready-to-eat foods.
• Use a separate chopping board for raw meat.
• Keep cooked food and raw food away from each other.
• Make sure that your fridge is at 5°C or below.
• Put chilled food in the fridge straight away and eat it as soon as possible.
• Throw out food that is gone past the ‘use by’ or the ‘best before’ date.
Folic acid
Folic acid helps to prevent spina bifida and other neural tube defects in your
baby. The baby’s spine develops very early in pregnancy, even before you may
realise you are pregnant, so it is important to start taking folic acid before you
become pregnant – ideally at least three months before. If you didn’t take
folic acid before your pregnancy, you should start to take it straight away and
continue to take it until 12 weeks. Include folate rich foods in your diet every
day, like green leafy vegetables, breakfast cereals, beans and citrus fruits, as
well as taking the folic acid tablet.
You can buy folic acid tablets over the counter from your pharmacist. If you
are on medication for a condition such as epilepsy, it is important to talk to
your GP about how to take folic acid with these. This is because some types
of medication work against folic acid and you might need to take a higher
amount. If you are also taking a multivitamin tablet, make sure that it is ok for
you to take it during your pregnancy.
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