Maternal metabolic risk factors for autism spectrum disorder-An analysis of electronic medical records and linked birth data.
Obesity and diabetes during pregnancy each raise autism odds about one-and-a-half times, a finding that repeats across studies.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Connolly et al. (2016) looked at electronic medical records and birth files. They wanted to see if moms who were obese or had diabetes during pregnancy were more likely to have a child later diagnosed with autism.
The team pulled data from a large health system. They compared moms of kids with ASD to moms of kids without ASD.
What they found
Moms with obesity raised the odds of ASD about one-and-a-half times. Moms with gestational diabetes did the same.
When a mom had both obesity and diabetes, the odds doubled. The increases were small but clear in the records.
How this fits with other research
Xu et al. (2014) reached the same 1.5-fold number two years earlier. Their meta-analysis pooled 12 studies and found almost identical risk. The new paper simply repeats the finding in a fresh data set.
Lyall et al. (2014) looked at maternal autoimmune disease instead of metabolism. They also saw a small jump in developmental disorders. Together the papers show that several mom-health issues—immune or metabolic—nudge ASD risk upward.
Zhong et al. (2020) flip the coin. They report that prenatal vitamins and folic acid lower ASD odds. The two views don’t clash; they simply map both risk and protection on the same prenatal shelf.
Why it matters
You can’t change a mom’s past weight or blood sugar, but you can use the info. When intake forms show obesity or GDM, flag the baby for extra developmental checks. Share the 1.5-fold figure with pediatricians so no red flags are missed.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
Past studies have suggested that conditions experienced by women during pregnancy (e.g. obesity and gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM)) may be associated with having a child with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Our objective was to compare mothers who had a child diagnosed with ASD to mothers of children with a non-ASD developmental disorder (DD) or without any reported DD (controls). To accomplish the objective we collected medical record data from patients who resided in the Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center's (CCHMC) primary catchment area and linked those data to data from birth certificates (to identify risk factors). Two comparison groups were analyzed; one with DD; and the other, controls without a reported ASD or DD. Descriptive statistics and regression analyses evaluated differences. Differences were greater comparing mothers of ASD to controls than comparing ASD to DD. Maternal obesity and GDM were associated with a statistically significant approximately 1.5-fold increased odds of having a child with an ASD. For mothers with both GDM and obesity, the association was twofold for having a child with ASD compared with controls. Maternal obesity and GDM might be associated with an increased risk of ASD in the offspring; however, no difference in risk of ASD according to BMI and GDM was seen when comparing to DD. Autism Res 2016, 9: 829-837,. © 2016 International Society for Autism Research, Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Autism research : official journal of the International Society for Autism Research, 2016 · doi:10.1002/aur.1586