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Mom's social support can affect
newborn's weight
The amount of social support women receive during
pregnancy can affect the birth weight of their babies, a report published this week
suggests.
Researchers asked some 250 pregnant women about the
support they get from their baby's father and from family. The team then followed the
women throughout pregnancy and correlated the amount of support each woman reported with
their baby's birth weight.
The investigators found that low levels of support were
significantly associated with lower birth weights. The effect held up even after the
researchers accounted for premature births, smoking, income levels and education,
according to the report published this week in the journal Psychosomatic Medicine.
'Social support is definitely playing an independent
role,' lead investigator Dr. Pamela J. Feldman told Reuters Health in an interview.
Still, that independent role was small. Statistical
analysis showed that social support directly accounted for only 2% of the change in
newborns' body weight. And while investigators did see an effect, it was not enough to
predict whether babies would be born under 2,500 grams--the clinical definition of low
birth weight, noted Feldman and colleagues at University College London in the UK.
In addition, only 14 women out of 250 had low birth
weight babies, seriously limiting the power of the study.
Part of the effect that was seen could come from the
stress-lowering effects of social contacts. Researchers have known for a while that
stress-induced hormones can affect fetal development and birth weight. But it is likely
that social support helps most because it influences women to eat well, seek good
health-related information, and get good prenatal care, Feldman's group suggests.
The researchers are also unsure how much or what kind of
support is needed in order to influence birth weight. It remains unclear whether support
from social workers, midwives, or physicians is enough to help women who do not have
support from friends and family, or how much is needed to overcome other factors that can
negatively affect fetal health.
'Simply providing support is not enough. It definitely
doesn't guarantee that you won't have a low birth weight baby,' Feldman said. |
