Trusted Information for Healthy Pregnancies
stress
“Love” Hormone Released When Mom’s Voice is Heard
May 12th
The working mother who cannot be at home to cuddle a distraught child can relax - her voice on the phone soothes as much as a hug, a study suggests.
US researchers put more than 60 girls in a stressful situation and monitored their hormonal responses when they were either phoned or hugged afterwards.
Their mother's voice produced virtually the same amount of the stress-quelling hormone oxytocin as physical comfort.
The findings appear in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B.
The girls, aged between seven and 12, were asked to make an impromptu speech and then solve a series of sums in front of a panel of strangers - experiences which sent their hearts racing and levels of the stress hormone cortisol soaring.
For one group of girls their mother was on hand immediately afterwards to offer physical comfort - a hug, or an arm around the shoulder. Another group was handed a phone with mother on the line, while a third watched March of the Penguins - seen as an emotionally-neutral film.
Oxytocin - a hormone believed to be strongly associated with social bonding, and one which alleviates the effects of cortisol - rose in both groups to similar levels. Oxytocin levels in the film group did not increase.
"It was understood that oxytocin release in the context of social bonding usually required physical contact," said Dr Leslie Seltzer of the University of Wisconsin-Madison, who led the research.
"But it's clear from these results that a mother's voice can have the same effect as a hug, even if they're not standing there."
Previous research suggesting physical contact was necessary to produce oxytocin in stressful circumstances was primarily carried out on rodents, therefore failing to take into account the very human impact of language, the researchers said.
Research has suggested that even in the womb a fetus - at least in the later stages of pregnancy - is capable of recognizing its mother's voice.
But whether this has any emotional impact at this young age is unclear.
Source
Stress early in pregnancy increases risks to babies
May 10th
Stressful situations in early pregnancy can lead to the birth of babies who are underweight or born too early, new research from China shows. Timing of the stress, the researchers found, was the key.
"The findings are modest, but significant," the authors write in the American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology.
The risks of premature births increased two-fold in women who were exposed to severe life events during their first and second trimesters - weeks 1-12 and 13-24, respectively. Premature birth, the authors note, is the single largest contributing factor in infant deaths in the developing world.
Researchers from Anhui Medical University, led by Dr. Peng Zhu, followed 1,800 pregnant women receiving prenatal treatment in 2008 at one hospital. The participants were surveyed on financial conditions, emotional support, traumatic events and their relationships with their spouses. Were jobs or fortunes lost, were family members cheated, did the family move, did a family member die or suffer an illness, or was there fighting or divorce?
There were 96 (5.3 percent) premature births and 55 (3.1 percent) low birth-weight babies.
Earlier studies have found that future moms with stressful lives were at greater risk of delivering preterm or low birth-weight babies. This study - looking at a long list of potentially stressful events experienced during pregnancy only - concluded that the earlier in pregnancy the stress occurred, the greater the risk.
The Zhu team found that premature birth was more than twice as likely if severely stressful events occurred during the first and second trimesters, but not the third. Low birthweight was nearly three times more likely if stress happened during the first trimester, compared to if it happened during the second or third trimester.
While for the most part consistent with earlier research, the Chinese researchers caution that the reach of their findings could be limited.
For instance, they warn that faulty memories, the small number of women in some of the stress categories, and the possibility that the list of stress events was flawed could weaken the power of the results.
The Zhu team concluded that health planners seeking to reduce the incidence of pre-term and low-weight births must take maternal stress into account when designing intervention programs.
Source
Older mothers’ kids have higher autism risk, study finds
Feb 8th
A 10-year study examining 4.9 million births in the 1990s has found more evidence that there's a link between autism and the mother's age at conception.
The link between the parents' age and children's health is not entirely new. Prior studies have indicated that babies born to older women have higher risks of birth defects, low birth weight and certain chromosome problems, such as Down syndrome.
A 2007 Kaiser Permanente study conducted in California reported that autism risk increased with both the mother's and father's age. An Israeli study based in statistics from 1980s had isolated only paternal age as being linked with increased risk for autism.
Dr. Max Wiznitzer, a pediatric neurologist at Rainbow Babies & Children's Hospital in Cleveland, Ohio, said the latest research had a far larger sample size.
In the latest study, researchers found that mothers over the age of 40 had 51 percent higher odds of having children with autism compared with mothers between the ages 25 and 29.
The father's age also played a factor, but only when he had a child with a woman under 30.
"When the mom has minimal age risk of an autistic child, we do see increased risks as dads get older," said lead author Janie Shelton, a graduate student researcher at UC-Davis.
It's unclear why the mother's age has more bearing in autism risk than the father's.
The study authors emphasize that while autism rates have risen 600 percent in the past two decades, older women having children contributed to only 5 percent more cases of autism.
As more women delay childbearing, it's important to keep the study in perspective, said Geraldine Dawson, chief science officer of Autism Speaks, the nation's largest autism science and advocacy organization.
"I don't think a mom blaming herself is going to help us understand what's causing autism or help prevent further cases," she said. "I would urge parents not to blame themselves, regardless of what age they are."
Shelton and the co-authors obtained all birth records in California from 1990 to 1999 and then collected data from the state's Department of Developmental Services to count the number of autism diagnoses from children born during that decade.
How parental age increases autism risks remains unknown, but several hypotheses exist. Some suggest that the cumulative effects of the environment, changes to the autoimmune system, stress and reproductive technology may affect autism risk.
Source
Healthy Baby Campaign Uses Texts to Reach Mothers
Feb 4th
Expectant mothers are getting a new tool to help keep themselves and their babies healthy: pregnancy tips sent directly to their cell phones.
The so-called text4baby campaign is the first free, health education program in the U.S. to harness the reach of mobile phones, according to its sponsors, which include Johnson & Johnson, Pfizer, WellPoint and CareFirst BlueCross and Blue Shield. Wireless carriers including AT&T, Verizon and Sprint have agreed to waive all fees for receiving the texts.
Organizers say texting is an effective means of delivering wellness tips because 90 percent of people in the U.S. have cell phones.
"Especially if you start talking about low-income people, cell phones are the indispensable tool for reaching them and engaging them about their health," said Paul Meyer, president of Voxiva, a company which operates health texting programs in Africa, Latin America and India.
Studies in those countries have shown that periodic texts can reduce smoking and other unhealthy behaviors in pregnant mothers.
Meyer said the U.S. program, run by Voxiva, will be the largest health-related texting program ever undertaken.
Under the new service, mothers-to-be who text "BABY" to 511411 will receive weekly text messages, timed to their due date or their baby's birth date. The messages, which have been vetted by government and nonprofit health experts, deal with nutrition, immunization and birth defect prevention, among other topics. The messages will continue through the baby's first birthday.
Text4baby is expected to be announced Thursday morning by officials from the White House's Office of Science and Technology Policy. Government officials will be publicizing the campaign in speeches and promotional materials.
Organizers hope the effort can curb premature births, which can be caused by poor nutrition, excessive stress, smoking and drinking alcohol. About 500,000 babies are born prematurely in the U.S. each year, and 28,000 infants die before their first birthday, according to the Healthy Mothers, Healthy Babies Coalition. The nonprofit is among the sponsors of the campaign.
"The real scary thing is that we're an industrialized nation and we're not doing very well on infant mortality, and we know prematurity is a big part of that," said the group's director, Judy Meehan.
Currently the U.S. ranks 30th worldwide for infant mortality, according to Meehan, behind most Western European nations.
Researchers at the George Washington University have agreed to evaluate the effectiveness of text4baby by measuring health trends for mothers and newborns.
Source
Massage Reduces Depression in Pregnant Women
Jan 26th
New research shows massage therapy reduced depression in pregnant women, and also reduced the incidence of massaged women's babies being born prematurely.
The study was conducted by researchers at the Touch Research Institutes, where pioneering research about massage has been conducted since 1992.
Pregnant women diagnosed with major depression were given 12 weeks of massage, twice per week, by their significant other. A control group did not receive massage, according to an abstract published on www.pubmed.gov.
The massage-therapy group versus the control group not only had reduced depression by the end of the massage-therapy period, they also had reduced depression and cortisol levels during the postpartum period.
The massaged women's newborns were also less likely to be born prematurely and low birthweight, pubmed noted, and they had lower cortisol levels and performed better on the Brazelton Neonatal Behavioral Assessment habituation, orientation and motor scales.
Source
Stress, Anxiety Can Up Risk of Depression in Pregnancy
Jan 22nd
Stress, history of depression, lack of social support and unintended pregnancy are among the major factors that contribute to increased risk of depression in pregnant women, a new study shows.
Other important factors are maternal anxiety, domestic violence and having public insurance coverage, said the University of Michigan researchers, who reviewed 159 studies conducted between 1980 and 2008.
The study appears in the January issue of the American Journal of Obstetrics & Gynecology.
Depression, which occurs in about 12.7 percent of pregnant women, can cause problems for mothers and babies, including pre-term delivery, preeclampsia, sleep disturbances and disrupted mother-infant bonding.
It's important for physicians to know how to identify depression in pregnant women, said the study authors, who noted that not all women who test positive on depression screening tests have or will develop clinical depression.
"We are hoping that [health-care] providers can use the presence or absence of risk factors such as those identified in our study to enhance their assessments for depression in addition to the information they obtain from the screening test," study author Dr. Christie A. Lancaster, a clinical lecturer in the obstetrics and gynecology department at U-M, said in a news release.
Source
Pot smoking during pregnancy may stunt fetal growth
Jan 22nd
Women who smoke marijuana during pregnancy may impair their baby's growth and development in the womb, a new study suggests.
Poor fetal growth and reduced head circumference at birth are linked to an increased risk of problems with thinking, memory and behavior in childhood. Cigarette smoking during pregnancy is known to impair fetal growth, but studies on the potential effects of marijuana have been inconclusive.
For the new study, researchers in the Netherlands followed more than 7,000 pregnant women, 3 percent of whom acknowledged smoking marijuana at least during early pregnancy. They found that babies born to marijuana users tended to weigh less and have smaller heads than other infants.
What's more, the study found, the longer a woman had used marijuana during pregnancy, the stronger the impact on birth size - suggesting that the drug itself was to blame.
And while most marijuana users in the study also smoked cigarettes, the drug appeared to have effects over and above those of tobacco. In fact, marijuana showed stronger effects on birth size than tobacco, the investigators report in the Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry.
The findings suggest that marijuana use, even restricted to early pregnancy, may have irreversible effects on fetal growth, write the researchers, led by Hannan El Marroun of Erasmus University Medical Center in Rotterdam.
The study included almost 7,500 pregnant women who were surveyed on their use of alcohol, tobacco and drugs, and had ultrasounds to chart fetal growth during the first, second and third trimesters.
Overall, 214 women said they had used marijuana before and during early pregnancy; 81 percent quit after learning they were pregnant, but 41 women continued to smoke marijuana throughout pregnancy.
The researchers found that, on average, marijuana users gave birth to smaller babies, particularly those who had used throughout pregnancy.
Women who had smoked only during early pregnancy had babies who were 156 grams -- about 5.5 ounces -- lighter than infants born to women who had not used the drug. Women who had continued to smoke past early pregnancy had babies who were 277 grams, or nearly 10 ounces, smaller.
Based on ultrasound, marijuana use only in early pregnancy impaired fetal growth by about 11 grams per week, while use throughout pregnancy slowed fetal growth by roughly 14 grams per week. That compared with a deficit of 4 grams per week with tobacco use, the researchers found.
Similar patterns were seen when the researchers looked at fetal head circumference.
According to El Marroun's team, mothers' marijuana use could stunt fetal growth for several reasons. Like tobacco smoking, it may deprive the fetus of oxygen. It is also possible that the byproducts of marijuana directly affect the developing nervous and hormonal systems of the fetus.
Finally, the researchers note, pregnant women who use marijuana may have other factors in their lives - such as a less-than-healthy diet or chronic stress -- that could contribute to poor fetal growth.
Source
Pregnant women develop emotion-reading superpowers
Dec 14th
Raging hormones during pregnancy prompt mood swings, but may also lead to a heightened ability to recognize threatening or aggressive faces. This may have evolved because it makes future mothers hyper-vigilant, yet it could also make them more vulnerable to anxiety.
Previous studies have suggested that a woman's ability to correctly identify fearful or disgusted facial expressions varies according to her stage of the menstrual cycle, with perception heightened on days associated with high levels of the hormone progesterone. Since levels of progesterone and other hormones rise dramatically in late pregnancy, Rebecca Pearson and her colleagues at the University of Bristol in the UK investigated whether the ability to read faces varies during pregnancy.
They asked 76 pregnant women to assign one of six emotions to 60 computer-generated faces before the 14th week of pregnancy, and again after the 34th week. Faces expressing happiness and surprise tended to be correctly assigned at both stages of pregnancy, but for faces expressing fear, anger and disgust, the accuracy rates were higher in late pregnancy.
This may increase the chance that the woman will spot potential threats to her and her fetus, and prime her to be hyper-vigilant once she becomes a mother. But it could have a downside. Pearson points out that people with clinical anxiety are also better at identifying negative emotions in faces. Pregnant women aren't clinically anxious, but "they might interpret negative or emotional things around them in a slightly more sensitive way", she says.
The finding builds on a recent study by Ben Jones of the University of Aberdeen in the UK who found that pregnant women - and women in stages of the menstrual cycle where progesterone levels spike - are better at identifying faces showing signs of sickness. "It's preventing them from becoming sick by interacting with people who are ill," he says.
The next step will be to examine whether pregnant women and new mothers are also more sensitive to emotional cues in babies' faces, Jones says.
Source
March of Dimes Reveals Pregnant Moms Biggest Fears
Dec 9th
The March of Dimes polled about 1,200 moms to find out exactly what it is that caused them to lose sleep (other than the fact they were pregnant!) while they were pregnant. The results were presented today at the March of Dimes National Communications Advisory Council luncheon where experienced, practicing obstetricians and gynecologists discussed the survey results, as well as some of the frequently asked questions their patients ask.
The March of Dimes poll found that the number one thing moms worried about was birth defects - 78 percent said they were worried their child would be born less than perfect. Stress was moms' second fear, with 74 percent answering that they were concerned if stress in their life would harm their baby's health. Preterm birth was a close third with 71 percent saying they were worried their baby would be born too soon.
"Women should discuss all their questions with their doctors and should be concerned about their overall health - quit smoking, control their blood pressure, weight and any chronic diseases, such as diabetes - before they become pregnant so they will have a better chance at a healthy pregnancy," said Dr. Diane Ashton, March of Dimes deputy medical director, who took part in the panel discussion.
Surprisingly, only 70 percent thought about the fear of pain of childbirth and 55 percent were worried that they wouldn't get to the hospital on time!
Other things moms worried about were:
- 60 percent worried they wouldn't be able to breastfeed successfully.
- 59 percent worried about losing weight after pregnancy.
- And, 59 percent worried about getting pregnant in the first place.
- Sushi and fish was the number one food concern, with 61 percent concerned.
The poll was conducted Nov. 6 to Nov. 13, 2009 using the online software Zoomerang. There were 123 valid responses from the 1,224 women from the March of Dimes Moms e-Panel and March for Babies Family Teams who were invited by email to answer the 65 questions. Some 90 percent of the women surveyed have a child who was born preterm. Nearly two-thirds of the respondents are employed, about 60 percent are between the ages of 25 and 34, 90 percent have children under the age of five and 95 percent had attended some college. The survey was written by Betty Wolder Levin, Ph.D., professor of Public Health, Graduate Center of the City University of New York.
Source
Nine Ways for Pregnant Moms to Avoid Premature Birth
Nov 17th
The following statistics regarding premature birth are sobering, to say the least.
- Currently the number of premature births in the United States is over 540,000 per year.
- The United States' infant mortality rate exceeds that of China, New Zealand, Canada, Hong Kong, Israel, Japan, Australia, and Singapore.
- It's estimated that simply by cutting the preterm birth rate in the US in half, to match Sweden's, would save approximately 8,000 babies.
- Even though preemies in the US are more likely to survive than anywhere else, they are still more likely to die than full-term infants.
- Just under half of premature babies grow up with some form of neurological or developmental disorder.
- Premature infants can develop lifelong health issues such as cerebral palsy, blindness, hearing loss and learning disabilities.
- Despite the increase in medical advances in the US, the amount of premature births has increased 36% in the last 25 years.
- It is the group of “late preterm” births, which occur after 34-37 weeks of pregnancy, that are the fastest growing subgroup of premature births.
- Get proper prenatal care throughout your pregnancy.
- Don’t smoke, drink or take drugs while pregnant.
- Avoid violent or abusive situations.
- Lower stress levels. Only take on as much as you are capable of, avoid extremely stressful situations and practice stress-relief exercises as needed.
- Avoid early elective inductions and cesareans. These might be used in emergency situations for the better of mom and baby, but elective cesareans and inductions should not be undertaken before 39 weeks of pregnancy.
- Eat a well-balanced, nutritious diet, including fish or fish oil and folic acid.
- Exercise regularly.
- Avoid exposure to environmental toxins like car exhaust, pesticides and phthalates.
- Avoid working situations where you need to stand for long periods of time.
- To learn more about premature labor, click here.
- KeepEmCookin.com is another resource that I would strongly recommend for patients at risk for preterm labor
