Tag: fetal growth

Is rapid growth after birth linked to improved intelligence in children who had poor fetal growth?

Yi Ying Ong, Nicholas Beng Hui Ng and Yung Seng Lee

Imagine two babies born at full term. Baby A had a normal growth rate in the womb but is born naturally small, while Baby B is born small after their growth in the womb slowed down. Baby B’s “fetal growth deceleration” may have been caused by placental issues or other conditions limiting the baby’s nutrient and oxygen supply, potentially affecting their brain development. Research studies have often lumped Baby A and Baby B together under the categories of “low birthweight” or “small for gestational age”, but these conditions are different from slowed fetal growth. As such, it remains unclear how fetal growth deceleration affects children’s cognitive abilities. 

Now, let’s look at what happens after birth — some believe that if Baby B’s growth catches up, it might compensate for the earlier growth problems and support better brain development. But is this true?

Continue reading “Is rapid growth after birth linked to improved intelligence in children who had poor fetal growth?” →

Is mismatch between poor fetal growth and rapid postnatal weight gain a pertinent health issue in contemporary well-nourished populations?

Yi Ying Ong, Yung Seng Lee and Navin Michael

Fetal undernutrition followed by abundant food after birth might be a recipe for disaster — it is linked to increased risk of obesity and cardiometabolic diseases later in life. The Dutch famine birth cohort study is a tragic “natural experiment” that exemplified this phenomenon. It observed that people born to mothers who experienced a transient period of severe famine during pregnancy, followed by a return to normal diet postnatally, had an increased risk of obesity and cardiometabolic diseases.

This mismatch between a poor fetal nutritional environment and a rich postnatal nutritional environment might cause fetal adaptive responses to become maladaptive, leading to greater cardiometabolic risk in adulthood. This is known as the developmental mismatch hypothesis.

However, is developmental mismatch still a pertinent health issue affecting cardiometabolic risk in contemporary well-nourished populations, who are not facing famine or drastic environmental stresses? In these populations, fetal undernutrition is more likely to result from uteroplacental insufficiency than maternal malnutrition.

Continue reading “Is mismatch between poor fetal growth and rapid postnatal weight gain a pertinent health issue in contemporary well-nourished populations?” →