THE RELATION BETWEEN INFANT BIRTHWEIGHT AND SUBSEQUENT DEVELOPMENT OF MATERNAL DIABETES MELLITUS

Publisher Website
Google Scholar
Abstract
THAT diabetic women frequently give birth to unusually large infants is well known. Only recently, however, has it been emphasized that infants of excessive weight may be born to mothers before clinically apparent maternal diabetes mellitus develops (1). Thus, the average weight of infants born to prediabetic mothers considerably exceeds the normal (2). The combined fetal and neonatal mortality rate is high in the prediabetic group as well as in the diabetic (3), and similar fetal, visceral changes are present in both groups (4). This study was undertaken to ascertain how the birthweight of an unusually large baby can be correlated with the likelihood of the subsequent development of maternal diabetes, and to determine the average time elapsing between the birth of a large baby and the development of clinical diabetes. METHODS One hundred parous, diabetic women with an average age of 55.3 years, who remembered the birthweights of their children, constitute the diabetic group (Group 1). These individuals were outpatients of the Washington University Diabetic Clinic or were hospitalized on the medical service of the Barnes Hospital. An equal number of parous women without glycosuria or symptoms of diabetes, from the medical and surgical public wards, served as controls (Group 2). The controls were also largely beyond the childbearing age; their average age was 51.2 years. Each group was asked for the following information: