Women with Bipolar Disorder Have a 50% Greater Risk of Delivering a Premature Baby

A new study was recently done at Women's College Hospital and at the Institute for Clinical Evaluative  Sciences (ICES) concerning the amount of premature babies born from women previously diagnosed with bipolar disorder. Bipolar disorder is a brain disorder that can cause major changes in mood, energy, or anything that has to do that can affect someone's everyday life.

In the study they conducted the researchers looked at the health record of women who delivered a baby between the years of 2003 and 2011. They then compared the women who were previously hospitalized for bipolar disorder and major depressive disorder to the general population. When the researchers did this they found many many differences between the women who have been hospitalized and the women who have not and the birth of their babies.

These findings included:
Women who have been previously hospitalized for bipolar disorder were twice as likely to give birth to a premature baby compared to women who have no history of mental illness.
Babies that were born to women with bipolar disorder were more likely to be bigger for their age while babies born to women with major depressive disorder were more likely to be smaller for their age.
Babies that were born to women with bipolar disorder were more likely to show birth defects and malformations.
Babies that were born to women with bipolar disorder were also more likely to be readmitted to the hospital just after 28 days of being home.

Although this study did not examine the causes that led to their findings they could still possibly try and reduce the risk of premature babies. Babies being born premature can also negatively affect their childhood and adulthood so every possible reduction to it is important. Since it is clear that women with mental illness are more likely to have premature babies this shows that stress hormones can lead to premature birth. We can also see that the symptoms of the mental illnesses can lead to premature birth such as lack of exercise, lack of nutrition, obesity and even lack of interaction with other people.


http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/11/141103114144.htm

Premature birth gene 'discovered'

In this article, there was a discovery made that there is a gene  linked to premature births. Researchers at Vanderbilt University, Washington University and the University of Helsinki suspected that there was some evolutionary pressure to  "adapt and shift the time of birth" to produce smaller babies. The researchers looked for DNA which showed evidence of "accelerated evolution". These are the genes which have mutated more in humans than in other primates and have identified 150 genes. For the research to go on the next step was to look for an association with premature births. What the researchers did was that compared 150 genes in 328 Finnish mothers, some whom had premature births. There was a strong relation to pre-term births with variants of the FSHR - or follicle stimulating hormone receptor - gene. The follicle  stimulating hormone acts a s a recptor in the ovaries to encourage follicle (a sphere of cells containing an egg).  development and production of the hormone oestrogen.

This study is very early in its stages and needs to become experiments and tested more until their can be conclusive evidence. This is because when scientist find a relation between two variable it is more deeper than those to variables.