Descripción del proyecto
Estudio sobre los efectos a largo plazo de las complicaciones del embarazo en la salud materna
Aunque la preeclampsia, el parto prematuro y otras complicaciones del embarazo pueden afectar a la salud materna, esta conexión aún no se ha estudiado en profundidad. El objetivo del proyecto HealthierWomen, financiado con fondos europeos, es estudiar los diversos patrones de complicaciones del embarazo que se producen solos o en combinación a lo largo de los embarazos y analizar su relación con la mortalidad materna por causas específicas. El estudio se llevará a cabo vinculando los datos relevantes de las historias clínicas reproductivas de mujeres incluidos en el Registro Médico de Nacimientos de Noruega con los registros de mortalidad y cáncer de la población. De este modo, el equipo de HealthierWomen aspira a aportar información nueva sobre cómo las complicaciones del embarazo afectan a la salud materna a largo plazo y a contribuir al desarrollo de estrategias más eficaces de prevención de enfermedades crónicas.
Objetivo
Pregnancy complications such as preeclampsia and preterm birth are known to affect infant health, but their influence on mothers’ long-term health is not well understood. Most previous studies are seriously limited by their reliance on information from the first pregnancy. Often they lack the data to study women’s complete reproductive histories. Without a complete reproductive history, the relationship between pregnancy complications and women’s long-term health cannot be reliably studied. The Medical Birth Registry of Norway, covering all births from 1967-, includes information on more than 3 million births and 1.5 million sibships. Linking this to population based death and cancer registries provides a worldwide unique source of population-based data which can be analysed to identify heterogeneities in risk by lifetime parity and the cumulative experience of pregnancy complications. Having worked in this field of research for many years, I see many erroneous conclusions in studies based on insufficient data. For instance, both after preeclampsia and after a stillbirth, the high risk of heart disease observed in one-child mothers is strongly attenuated in women with subsequent pregnancies. I will study different patterns of pregnancy complications that occur alone or in combination across pregnancies, and analyse their associations with cause specific maternal mortality. Using this unique methodology, I will challenge the idea that placental dysfunction is the origin of preeclampsia and test the hypothesis that pregnancy complications may cause direct long-term effects on maternal health. The findings of this research have the potential to advance our understanding of how pregnancy complications affect the long-term maternal health and help to develop more effective chronic disease prevention strategies.
Ámbito científico
Palabras clave
Programa(s)
Régimen de financiación
ERC-ADG - Advanced GrantInstitución de acogida
5020 Bergen
Noruega