Study links asthma with foetus size

Research has pointed to a possible link between foetus size and childhood asthma, with those who were smaller than the average at a certain stage of pregnancy at a higher risk of developing the disease.

According to a team from the University of Aberdeen, children who were ten per cent or five millimetres smaller ten weeks into gestation were more likely to suffer from asthma between the ages of five and ten years.

A total of 1,500 pregnant women participated in the survey, being measured during their first and second trimesters before their offspring were examined at ten years old. A correlation was also discovered between diminutive foetus size and eczema and hayfever.

In addition, unborn babies who continued to grow at a below-median rate beyond the tenth week of pregnancy were found to have been five times more likely to contract asthma.

Earlier this month, experts from the University of Auckland found that mothers-to-be who slept on their back or right side were at greater risk of stillbirth than those who lay on their left. 

Allergy treatment news :  30 June 2011