Parents of children who are born with low birth weight may be at heightened risk of cardiovascular diseases. This is as truer for the mothers as well as for the fathers.
In a research done by the researchers of Karolinska Institutet report that poor fetal growth that leads to low birth weight stems may lead to higher risk of cardiovascular diseases. However this may be a genetic condition coming from the parents. Hence parents of the children with low birth weight may also be at more risk of death from cardiovascular causes.The study had analyzed the association between birth weight of babies and their parent’s rate of mortality by looking into the data generated from 783,814 children born in Sweden from the year 1973 to 1980. The results have shown that there is a significant inverse association between the birth weight of the babies and risk of cardiovascular diseases in the fathers. The researchers have accounted for the result as it being genetical by nature. The report also points out that mothers may be at risk of death from cardiac problems more than fathers of babies of low birth weights.
Reference: Karolinska Institutet, news release, June 2005
