Pregnancy
Late-pregnancy depression predicts postnatal woes
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Helping women who suffer from depression during pregnancy could reduce their risk of remaining depressed after giving birth and, in turn, reduce the level of stress they experience in early parenthood, Australian researchers report.
The strongest predictor of whether or not a woman would have postnatal depression was whether she was depressed shortly before giving birth, also known as the antenatal period, Drs. Bronwyn Leigh of Heidelberg Repatriation Hospital Austin Health in Heidelberg Heights and Jeannette Milgrom of the University of Melbourne found. And postnatal depression was, in turn, the only significant risk factor for high levels of parenting stress.
To date, research and treatment efforts have targeted postnatal depression, the researchers note, but less is known about risk factors for antenatal depression and early parenting stress.
Exercise may reduce risk of preterm birth
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Women who are physically active during pregnancy may lower their chances of delivering prematurely, according to findings from a Danish study,
Using the Danish National Birth Cohort database, Mette Juhl, of the National Institute of Public Health, in Copenhagen, and colleagues analyzed physical activity information reported by 87,232 pregnant women between 1996 and 2002.
Overall, about one-third of the women said they participated in physical exercise, such as swimming, or low-impact leisure time activity such as aerobics, dancing, walking or hiking, bicycling, and yoga during early pregnancy.
Pregnancy is possible after cancer treatment
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It has been reported for the first time in Germany that healthy ovarian tissue has been taken from a non-pregnant woman with cancer and then re-implanted after cancer therapy. The patient is now 32 years old and could become pregnant as a result. This case is described by Ralf Dittrich and his colleagues from Erlangen University Hospital in the current issue of Deutsches Ärzteblatt International (Dtsch Arztebl Int 2008; 105[15]: 274-8).
Biology of Reproduction highlights
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For young male offspring who suffer a dominant mother, a brother may be on the way to help bear the burden. And all because of follicular testosterone. A growing body of evidence suggests a maternal influence on sex determination: dominant human females conceive more sons. Grant et al., in an article on p. 812 of the May issue of Biology of Reproduction, find that the sex of bovine embryos positively correlates with pre-ovulatory follicular testosterone. How exposure of oocytes to follicular testosterone may influence the ability of a metaphase II egg to be preferentially inseminated by a Y-bearing sperm remains a mystery. What is known is that chronic stress elevates testosterone in females (but not males). So if you would like your next sibling to be a sister, don’t aggravate your mother.
Sex of Bovine Embryos May Be Related to Mothers’ Preovulatory Follicular Testosterone. V. J. Grant, R. J. Irwin, N.T. Standley, A. N. Shelling, and L. W. Chamley. Biol Reprod 2008; 78:812-815. Published online in BOR Papers-In-Press 9 January 2008; DOI 10.1095/biolreprod.107.066050
Methamphetamine use in pregnancy changes learning ability of the offspring
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Studies have suggested that infants exposed to methamphetamines while in the womb can suffer irreversible brain damage, although the exact effects of these drugs during pregnancy have been hard to pinpoint due to many other negative behaviors that often occur in meth users.
Now, using a guinea pig model that can assess neural changes in offspring born to mothers given methamphetamine during an otherwise normal pregnancy, Dr. Sanika Samuel Chirwa provides new evidence for the cognitive damage of these drugs.
Withdrawal Method of Contraception: How it Works
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Many couples use a form of birth control know as the withdrawal method of contraception, or “the pull out method”. Some couples prefer the withdrawal method of contraception because it allows for spontaneity, is a non-hormonal form of birth control and it is free. When practiced perfectly, the withdrawal method of contraception is about 96% effective in the prevention of pregnancy.
The withdrawal method of contraception does not prevent the spread of sexually transmitted diseases. That is because the withdrawal method of contraception does allow for contact with bodily fluid. In fact, many people assume the failure rate associated with the incorrect use of the withdrawal method is actually due to the pre-seminal fluid, also known as pre-ejaculate. While pre-seminal fluid does contain sexually transmitted diseases, it does not contain sperm.
Proper Seatbelt Use by Pregnant Women Would Save 200 Fetuses/Year
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A new study could have a profound effect on fetal deaths and injuries caused by car accidents.
The study, by researchers at the University of Michigan, found that about 200 fetuses each year would not be lost if pregnant women properly buckled their seatbelts every time they were in an automobile.
“It’s very clear, based on this study, that pregnant women should buckle up every single time they’re in a vehicle,” says senior author Mark D. Pearlman, M.D., vice-chair in the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at the U-M Health System. “Our study strongly suggests that about 200 fetuses each year would not lose their lives if women simply buckled up each time.” An estimated 370 fetuses die as a result of car crashes each year in the United States.
Mom’s fish intake may boost child’s brain power
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Preschoolers whose mothers regularly ate low-mercury fish during pregnancy may have sharper minds than their peers, a study suggests.
Researchers found that among 341 3-year-olds, those whose mothers ate more than two servings of fish per week during pregnancy generally performed better on tests of verbal, visual and motor development.
On the other hand, tests scores were lower among preschoolers whose mothers had relatively high mercury levels in their blood during pregnancy.
Britain urges pregnant women to avoid alcohol
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Women should drink no alcohol during the first three months of pregnancy, despite uncertainty over whether the odd drink could harm their baby, a British government watchdog said on Wednesday.
The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) said there was limited evidence that drinking in the early stages of pregnancy may be linked to a higher risk of miscarriage.
Its new guidance says that pregnant women who choose to drink should limit their intake to one or two units, once or twice a week.
Comprehensive sex ed may cut teen pregnancies
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Comprehensive sex education that includes discussion of birth control may help reduce teen pregnancies, while abstinence-only programs seem to fall short, the results of a U.S. survey suggest.
Using data from a 2002 national survey, researchers found that among more than 1,700 unmarried, heterosexual teens between 15 and 19 years old, those who’d received comprehensive sex ed in school were 60 percent less likely to have been pregnant or gotten someone pregnant than teens who’d had no formal sex education.
Meanwhile, there was no clear benefit from abstinence-only education in preventing pregnancy or delaying sexual intercourse, the researchers report in the Journal of Adolescent Health.
Birth weight may influence lifespan: study
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Low birth weight confers an increased risk of dying early as an adult, but people born extra-heavy are at greater risk too, according to the largest study to date to look at birth weight and mortality from any cause.
“More infants than ever before are being born with these high birth weights,” Dr. Jennifer Baker of the Centre for Health and Society in Copenhagen, who led the study, told Reuters Health. “Further research is really needed to determine what may happen to these children when they grow up.”
Past research has linked small size at birth to heart disease and diabetes risk, while people who were very large babies seem to have a heightened risk of obesity and cancer. But studies of birth rate and mortality risk have had mixed results, and no one study has looked at more than 29 birth years in a row.
Acid-blockers in pregnancy up kids’ asthma risk
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Children whose mothers took stomach acid-blocking medication during pregnancy have increased odds of developing asthma, a Boston team announced here at the annual meeting of the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology.
The findings were presented by Dr. Elizabeth H. Yen of Children’s Hospital, Boston. Her group analyzed data from three national Swedish healthcare registries to examine acid-blocker use by pregnant women in relation to rates of asthma in their children.
Early heart monitoring predicts pregnancy trouble
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In healthy women who’ve never given birth before, alterations in heart function and blood flow in the uterus in early pregnancy may help predict preeclampsia, a potentially serious complication involving high blood pressure, that often leads to premature delivery, UK investigators report.
In the new study, 534 women pregnant with a single fetus underwent ultrasound testing of their heart and the blood vessels that supply the uterus between 11 and 14 weeks of pregnancy.
The research team compared heart function and uterine blood flow in women who had preeclampsia, a small infant, both or neither. The findings appear in BJOG: An International Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology.
Early breast-feeding reduces newborn deaths
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Initiation of breast-feeding within the first hour after birth or during the first day of life reduces the risk of death for the newborn, according to results of a study from Nepal. Although newborn death rates are already very low in the US, in low-resource countries like Nepal, they can be relatively high.
Dr. Luke Mullany and colleagues from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in Baltimore and a team with the Nepal Nutrition Intervention Project, Katmandu, analyzed data on measures to reduce newborn deaths.
If pregnant women stop smoking, babies are happier
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Mothers who stop smoking while pregnant tend to have cheerier, more adaptable babies, British researchers reported on Wednesday.
Babies of women who continued to smoke while pregnant were notably grumpy, and the researchers believe that mothers who can muster the effort to kick the habit are also caring more for their babies in other ways.
Babies of non-smokers also are more temperamental than babies born to quitters, the researchers found—which they said suggested that mothers who suspend smoking are doing something special.
