(Ivanhoe Newswire) -- Stressed out pregnant women may be putting their
babies at risk for developing asthma.
Researchers compared the cord blood of infants born to moms in high stress
environments to moms in lower stress situations, and discovered certain
differences in immune function markers that could be linked to asthma risk later
in life.
Together, 557 families were involved in the study, mostly ethnic minorities, and
20 percent of who were living below poverty level. Each baby's mother or father
had a history of asthma or allergy.
To get their data, researchers first isolated immune cells from the blood and
then exposed them to different stimuli, like dust, viruses and bacteria. They
then looked at how many cytokines those cells produced as an indicator of how
well the child's immune system responded.
"This is the first study in humans to show that increased stress experienced
during pregnancy in these urban, largely minority women, is associated with
different patterns of cord blood cytokine production to various environmental
stimuli, relative to babies born to lower-stressed mothers," Rosalind Wright,
M.D., M.P.H., an associate physician at Brigham and Women's Hospital, in Boston,
was quoted as saying.
It has been known that asthma is occurs more among ethnic minorities and
disadvantaged urban communities, but the difference in risk cannot be completely
attributed to known physical factors.
"The current findings suggest that psychological stress is involved in
programming of the infant immune response and that this influence begins during
pregnancy," Dr. Wright said. "As these infants mature, we will learn how these
factors manifest later in terms of the development of asthma and allergy."
Source: American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine, published
online March 2010
