BACKGROUND The control of growth and nutritional status in the foetus and neonate is a complex mechanism, in which also hormones produced by adipose tissue, such as adiponectin and leptin are involved. The aim of this study was to evaluate levels of adiponectin, leptin and insulin in appropriate (AGA) and small for gestational age (SGA) children during the 1st year of life and to correlate thes...

The placental weight ratio (PWR) is a health indicator that reflects the balance between fetal and placental growth. The PWR is defined as the placental weight divided by the birth weight, and it changes across gestation. Its ranges are not well established. We aimed to establish PWR distributions by gestational age and to investigate whether the PWR distributions vary by fetal growth adequacy,...

BACKGROUND There is evidence that intrauterine growth restriction, resulting in newborn girls that are small for gestational age (SGA), may be related to the onset of polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS). Thus, we studied whether women born SGA have a higher prevalence of PCOS than women born appropriate for gestational age (AGA). METHODS This was a prospective birth cohort study of 384 women bor...

BACKGROUND Few studies have differentiated risk factors for term-small for gestational age (SGA), preterm-appropriate for gestational age (AGA), and preterm-SGA, despite evidence of varying risk of child mortality and poor developmental outcomes. METHODS We analyzed birth outcome data from singleton infants, who were enrolled in a large randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial of ne...

BACKGROUND Being born small for gestational age (SGA) is associated with decreased insulin sensitivity and increased blood pressure in childhood, but the association with clinical disease in early adulthood is less certain. The Danish Medical Birth Registry has registered all births in Denmark since 1973, but due to variable data quality, data is most often used only from 1981 onwards, and birt...

INTRODUCTION The pregnancy complications preeclampsia, gestational hypertension, small for gestational age infants (SGA) and pre-term birth (PTB) affect approximately 21% of all pregnancies. The Vascular Endothelial Growth Factor family (VEGF) is implicated in the pathogenesis of these complications. We aimed to evaluate the placental mRNA expression of VEGFA, PGF, FLT1 and KDR in pregnancies c...

BACKGROUND Cardiac blood flow measurements are useful in the haemodynamic management of neonates. Cardiac blood flows can be estimated with functional echocardiography as follows; flow in Superior Vena Cava (SVC), Right Ventricular Outflow (RVO) and Left Ventricular Outflow (LVO). Studies in preterm infants have shown that abnormal superior vena cava flow is associated with poor neurodevelopmen...

OBJECTIVES To examine whether single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in VEGFA (-2578 C/A and +936 C/T) associate with small-for-gestational-age (SGA) pregnancies and to identify their effects on first-trimester placental VEGFA expression. DESIGN Multicenter prospective cohort study. SETTINGS Adelaide, Australia, and Auckland, New Zealand. PARTICIPANTS A total of 3234 nulliparous pregnant ...

OBJECTIVE The objective of this study was to explore the association between sexual violence and neonatal outcomes. DESIGN National cohort study. SETTING Women were recruited to the Norwegian Mother and Child Cohort Study (MoBa) while attending routine ultrasound examinations from 1999 to 2008. POPULATION A total of 76 870 pregnant women. METHODS Sexual violence and maternal characteris...

To assess the influence of intrauterine growth retardation and postnatal development on heart rate variability (HRV) and cardiac reflexes, we studied 27 healthy small for gestational age (SGA) and 23 appropriate for gestational age (AGA) infants during a nap study. Resting HRV was assessed by point dispersion of Poincaré plots for overall (SDRR) and instantaneous beat-to-beat variability (SDDel...