Pregnancy
Risk factor for deadly newborn infections identified
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In pregnancy, the time between when a woman’s water breaks—what doctor’s call rupture of the membranes—and delivery is directly associated with the risk of serious infections in newborns, independent of how long labor lasts, a new study shows.
Deadly infections (also called neonatal sepsis) affect as many as 1 percent of newborns and carry a death rate approaching 50 percent. An extended time between rupture of the membranes and delivery is a recognized risk factor for infection in mom and newborn, but whether the duration of labor influences the risk is unclear.
Obesity may raise the risk of stillbirth
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Obese pregnant women may have an increased risk of losing their baby relatively late in pregnancy, and black women appear particularly at risk, a large study suggests.
Researchers found that obese women were 40 percent more likely than normal-weight and overweight women to have their pregnancy end in stillbirth—defined as fetal death in the 20th week of pregnancy or later.
Anxiety over pregnancy linked to premature birth
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Women who are particularly anxious about their pregnancy may be at increased risk of premature delivery, a new study suggests.
Researchers found that among 1,820 pregnant women, those with the greatest concerns about their pregnancy were nearly three times more likely than those with the least anxiety to deliver prematurely. The findings are published in the journal Psychosomatic Medicine.
Neuro symptoms in pregnancy rarely stroke-related
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Neurological symptoms that occur during pregnancy are rarely caused by a mini-stroke, or “transient ischemic attack” (TIA), but instead are usually associated with migraine with “aura,” according to a report in BMC Medicine.
Aura refers to symptoms that may precede the onset of a migraine (and also seizures), such as seeing flashing lights or temporary vision loss.
Infant blood pressure high if mother smokes
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Very young infants, especially boys, who were exposed to tobacco smoke in the womb tend to have higher systolic blood pressure - the number on top of the reading—than their unexposed counterparts, results of a study in the Netherlands suggest.
Multiple investigations have revealed evidence of an association between mothers who smoke during pregnancy and higher blood pressure in their offspring, note Dr. Cuno S.P.M. Uiterwaal and colleagues in the medical journal Hypertension. However, they add, the question remains as to whether the association occurs in the women or during the postnatal period.
Overweight women at risk of pregnancy complications
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The heavier a woman is before pregnancy, the greater her risk of a range of pregnancy complications, a large study suggests.
Using data from more than 24,000 UK women who gave birth between 1976 and 2005, researchers found that the risk of problems, such as high blood pressure, pre-eclampsia and premature delivery climbed in tandem with a woman’s pre-pregnancy weight.
India to register pregnancies to fight feticide
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India plans to create a registry of all pregnancies to help curb widespread female feticide and reduce its high infant mortality rate, although activists say the scheme will be hard to implement.
“With this, mysterious abortions will become difficult,” Women and Child Development Minister Renuka Chowdhury told the Hindustan Times.
Internet blamed for Shanghai teen pregnancies
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Nearly half of the pregnant teens in China’s financial hub, Shanghai, met their partners on the Internet, state media said on Tuesday.
Zhang Zhengrong, a doctor who oversees the city’s first-aid hotline for pregnant teens, said 46 percent of the more than 20,000 teenage girls who called the hotline over the past two years said they had had sex with boys they met on the Internet.
Prenatal secondhand smoke tied to mental problems
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Pregnant women exposed to secondhand smoke are more likely than their unexposed counterparts to have children with psychological problems such as conduct disorder, attention deficits, and behavior problems, a study suggests.
While such problems are known to be more common among children whose mothers smoked while pregnant, this study is the first to find that passive smoking poses a risk as well, Drs. Lisa M. Gatzke-Kopp and Theodore P. Beauchaine of the University of Washington in Seattle note in the journal Child Psychiatry and Human Development.
High Stress Increases Pregnancy Risk
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High stress levels with low social support during pregnancy can place women at risk for premature labor and preeclampsia. A new study shows that mental health anguish can trigger inflammatory responses that can place both the mother and baby at risk.
Preeclampsia, symptoms of which include sudden increases in blood pressure, excessive weight gain and severe headaches, can affect the mother’s kidney, liver and brain function. If left untreated, preeclampsia can result in seizures or even coma during pregnancy. Uncontrolled preeclampsia can threaten the life of both the mother and the baby.
Does Anxiety Influence Pregnancy Outcomes?
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A review of research conducted over the course of nearly 40 years has lead scientists to comment that experiencing anxiety symptoms during pregnancy is not associated with an increased risk of having a longer labor or a low birth weight baby. According to the authors, previous research examining whether anxiety during pregnancy does cause harmful effects had shown mixed results.
Still, researchers believe additional research is needed as a number of important outcomes that have been theorized to be affected by anxiety, such as development of pre-eclampsia have not been studied. The review, by University of Texas Medical Branch scientists, will be presented at the 114th annual convention of the American Psychological Association (APA).
Antidepressants OK During Pregnancy
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Medical authorities have struggled over the potential risk for newborns when a certain class of depression medications is taken during pregnancy. New research suggests use of certain selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors antidepressants do not appear to increase the risk for most kinds of birth defects.
Researchers from Boston University’s Slone Epidemiology Center suggest that individual SSRIs may increase the risk for some specific defects, but these are rare and the absolute risks are small.
Use of Selective Serotonin-Reuptake Inhibitors in Pregnancy and the Risk of Birth Defects
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Information regarding the safety of selective serotonin-reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) in human pregnancy is sparse. Concern has been raised about the risk of congenital heart defects associated with the use of SSRIs in pregnancy.
Methods We obtained data on 9622 case infants with major birth defects and 4092 control infants born from 1997 through 2002 from the National Birth Defects Prevention Study. Case infants were ascertained through birth-defects surveillance systems in eight U.S. states; controls were selected randomly from the same geographic areas. Mothers completed a standardized telephone interview regarding exposure to potential risk factors, including medications, before and during pregnancy. Exposure to SSRIs was defined as treatment with any SSRI from 1 month before to 3 months after conception. Birth defects were assigned to 26 categories and subcategories.
C-section not linked to poorer infant health
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Despite some concerns to the contrary, babies delivered by cesarean may not make more visits to the doctor’s office or hospital early in life, a study has found.
Some research has suggested that C-sections may affect children’s long-term health, possibly increasing their chances of conditions such as asthma, allergies and gastrointestinal symptoms.
IVF pregnancies may be happier than natural ones
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Women who conceive through in vitro fertilization (IVF) are just as happy in late pregnancy as women who conceive naturally—maybe even more so, new research from Israel suggests.
It had been thought that IVF moms were more stressed than those who conceived naturally. “A lot of studies have come out and said that they were indeed more anxious and they were having a worse time of it,” Dr. Marsha Kaitz of Hebrew University in Jerusalem, the study’s lead author, told Reuters Health. “My paper says that that isn’t necessarily the case. The women that I interviewed were really quite positive.”
