ReviewEuropean journal of epidemiology2006
Hypotheses on the fetal origins of adult diseases: contributions of epidemiological studies.
Review in European journal of epidemiology, 2006. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 18 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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
18 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- Maternal and fetal outcomes in pregnant women with rheumatoid arthritis: a systematic review and meta-analysis.Clinical rheumatology · 2023Pooled it
- Prenatal and postnatal droughts interact in shaping cognitive development.Communications medicine · 2026Article
- Rheumatoid arthritis and adverse pregnancy outcomes: a bidirectional two-sample mendelian randomization study.BMC pregnancy and childbirth · 2024Article
- Article
- Low Birth Weight, β-Cell Function and Insulin Resistance in Adults: The Brazilian Longitudinal Study of Adult Health.Frontiers in endocrinology · 2022Article
- Prediction and Understanding of Resilience in Albertan Families: Longitudinal Study of Disaster Responses (PURLS) - Protocol.Frontiers in psychiatry · 2019Article
- Japanese secular trends in birthweight and the prevalence of low birthweight infants during the last three decades: A population-based study.Scientific reports · 2016Article
- Early-life origins of life-cycle well-being: research and policy implications.Journal of policy analysis and management : [the journal of the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management] · 2015Article
- The All Our Babies pregnancy cohort: design, methods, and participant characteristics.BMC pregnancy and childbirth · 2013Article
- Preimplantation stress and development.Birth defects research. Part C, Embryo today : reviews · 2012Review
- Association of SLC38A4 and system A with abnormal fetal birth weight.Experimental and therapeutic medicine · 2012Article
- Cardiovascular and metabolic influences of fetal smoke exposure.European journal of epidemiology · 2011Review
- Early vascular phenotypes in the genesis of hypertension.Pediatric nephrology (Berlin, Germany) · 2010Review
- Birth weight and characteristics of endothelial and smooth muscle cell cultures from human umbilical cord vessels.Journal of translational medicine · 2009Article
- Modeling the variability of shapes of a human placenta.Placenta · 2008Article
- The Peter Pan paradigm.Theoretical biology & medical modelling · 2008Article
- Fetal nutritional origins of adult diseases: challenges for epidemiological research.European journal of epidemiology · 2008Article
- Recent trends in publications in the European Journal of Epidemiology.European journal of epidemiology · 2008Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
2 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Epidemiological studies have demonstrated associations between low birth weight and cardiovascular disease, type 2 diabetes and their risk factors in adult life. These findings have led to sharp debates in the literature concerning potential methodological study flaws and the effect size and causality of the associations. More recent studies seem to have overcome most methodological flaws and suggest a small effect size of low birth weight on adult diseases for the individual. However, the effect size may still be important on a population level. Various causal pathways have been hypothesized as mechanisms underlying these associations. These hypotheses have proposed central roles for (1) fetal undernutrition, (2) increased cortisol exposure, (3) genetic susceptibility and (4) accelerated post-natal growth. These hypotheses have been studied in various epidemiological study designs. Thus far, it is still not known which mechanisms underlie the associations between low birth weight and diseases in adult life. The causal pathways linking low birth weight to diseases in later life seem to be complex and may include combined environmental and genetic mechanisms in various periods of life. Well-designed epidemiological studies are necessary to estimate the population effect size and to identify the underlying mechanisms. This knowledge is needed to develop strategies for identifying groups at risk and prevention focused on early life.
Indexed as
Identifiers
16518677What 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.