Associations between pre-pregnancy obesity and asthma symptoms in adolescents
Background: The high prevalence of children's asthma symptoms, worldwide, is unexplained. We examined the relation between maternal pre-pregnancy weight and body mass index (BMI), and asthma symptoms in adolescents. Methods: Data from 6945 adolescents born within the Northern Finland Birth Coho...
| Published in: | Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health |
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| Main Authors: | , , , , , , , , , , |
| Format: | Article in Journal/Newspaper |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
2016
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://doi.org/10.1136/jech.2011.133777 https://ora.ox.ac.uk/objects/uuid:5032c4ed-1d4b-4505-8488-651bb27ff2be |
| Summary: | Background: The high prevalence of children's asthma symptoms, worldwide, is unexplained. We examined the relation between maternal pre-pregnancy weight and body mass index (BMI), and asthma symptoms in adolescents. Methods: Data from 6945 adolescents born within the Northern Finland Birth Cohort 1986 were used. Prospective antenatal and birth outcome data, including maternal pre-pregnancy weight and BMI, and asthma symptoms in adolescent offspring at age 15-16 years, were employed. Logistic regression analyses were performed to examine the associations between relevant prenatal factors and asthma symptoms during adolescence. Results: Current wheeze (within the past year) was reported by 10.6% of adolescents, and physiciandiagnosed asthma by 6.0%. High maternal pre-pregnancy BMI was a significant predictor of wheeze in the adolescents (increase per kilogram per square metre unit; 2.7%, 95% CI 0.9 to 4.4 for ever wheeze; 3.5%, 95% CI 1.3 to 5.8 for current wheeze), and adjusting for potential confounders further increased the risk (2.8%, 95% CI 0.5 to 5.1; 4.7%, 95% CI 1.9 to 7.7, respectively). High maternal pre-pregnancy weight, in the top tertile, also significantly increased the odds of current wheeze in the adolescent by 20% (95% CI 4 to 39), and adjusting for potential confounders further increased the risk (OR=1.52, 95% CI 1.19 to 1.95). Results were similar for current asthma. Furthermore, these significant associations were observed only among adolescents without parental history of atopy but not among those with parental history of atopy. Conclusions: The association demonstrated here between maternal pre-pregnancy overweight and obesity, and asthma symptoms in adolescents suggests that increase in asthma may be partly related to the rapid rise in obesity in recent years. |
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