Offspring birthweight in consecutive pregnancies can help identify a woman's long-term risk of CVD mortality

Reviewed by Megan Craig, M.Sc.May 30 2023

A new study from the University of Bergen reveals that including offspring birthweight information from women's subsequent births, is helpful in identifying a woman's long-term risk of dying from cardiovascular causes.

Knowledge of the association between offspring birthweight and long-term maternal cardiovascular disease (CVD) mortality is often based on first-born infants without considering women's consecutive births.

"These possible relations are also less closely studied among women with term deliveries", says Yeneabeba Sima, the first author of the article that is newly published in the American Journal of Epidemiology.

Using linked data from the Medical Birth Registry and Cause of Death Registry, the researchers evaluated long-term CVD mortality by offspring birthweight patterns among women with spontaneous and clinician-initiated term deliveries from 1967-2020.

"We found that women with first normal weight offspring and a small second offspring had increased risk of cardiovascular mortality, while reduced risk if the second offspring was large."

This was true for women with both spontaneous and clinician-initiated term deliveries.

Changes in offspring birthweight quartiles from first to second pregnancy offer important information on heterogeneity in women's future risk of CVD death."

Yeneabeba Sima, first author