ReviewJournal of the National Medical Association2003
Birthweight, rapid growth, cancer, and longevity: a review.
Review in Journal of the National Medical Association, 2003. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 17 papers.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
17 citing papers in PubMed.
- Early-Life Lead Exposure and Male Longevity: Evidence from Historical Municipal Water Systems.Explorations in economic history · 2025Article
- Women exposed to famine in early gestation have increased mortality up to age 76 years.Paediatric and perinatal epidemiology · 2025Article
- The Siren Song of Cicadas: Early-Life Pesticide Exposure and Later-Life Male Mortality.Journal of environmental economics and management · 2024Article
- Maternal human capital and infants' health outcomes: Evidence from minimum dropout age policies in the US.SSM - population health · 2022Article
- Article
- Placental Gene Co-expression Network for Maternal Plasma Lipids Revealed Enrichment of Inflammatory Response Pathways.Frontiers in genetics · 2021Article
- Early pregnancy dyslipidemia is associated with placental DNA methylation at loci relevant for cardiometabolic diseases.Epigenomics · 2020Observational
- Association of maternal serum lipids at late gestation with the risk of neonatal macrosomia in women without diabetes mellitus.Lipids in health and disease · 2018Article
- Maternal Determinants of Birth Weight in Northern Ghana.PloS one · 2015Article
- Connecting serum IGF-1, body size, and age in the domestic dog.Age (Dordrecht, Netherlands) · 2011Article
- Age-related cataract in dogs: a biomarker for life span and its relation to body size.Age (Dordrecht, Netherlands) · 2011Article
- Dietary fat impacts fetal growth and metabolism: uptake of chylomicron remnant core lipids by the placenta.American journal of physiology. Endocrinology and metabolism · 2011Article
- Transport of maternal cholesterol to the fetus is affected by maternal plasma cholesterol concentrations in the golden Syrian hamster.Journal of lipid research · 2009Article
- Effect of birth size and proportionality on BMI and skinfold thickness in early adolescence: prospective birth cohort study.European journal of clinical nutrition · 2009Article
- Enhanced placental cholesterol efflux by fetal HDL in Smith-Lemli-Opitz syndrome.Molecular genetics and metabolism · 2008Article
- Metabolic programming in the pathogenesis of insulin resistance.Reviews in endocrine & metabolic disorders · 2007Review
- Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
3 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
The fetal growth restriction hypothesis states that retarded growth in utero promotes health problems later in life. While most of the studies on intrauterine growth retardation (as measured by birthweight) confirm this hypothesis, many researchers have found flaws in these studies. In addition, many studies have found either no correlation or a positive relation between birthweight (BW) and adult blood pressure or mortality. Furthermore, high BW leads to greater adult obesity and chronic disease, and increasing macrosomia in newborns raises the risk for birth-related problems. Increased cancer risk is also tied to higher BW, and catch-up or accelerated growth generally has negative health effects. Adult height has been found to correlate with greater BW and birthlength (BL), and several studies have found an inverse relation between height and longevity. Paradoxical findings, such as lower BW and low levels of cardiovascular disease in the developing world, are presented. Within 25 years, genetic engineering will allow in utero alterations to the fetus, resulting in higher BW and taller adults. The authors suggest that increased BW leading to larger adult body size has dangerous implications in terms of human health and survival.
Indexed as
Identifiers
14717473PMC2594855What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.