Association of Prenatal Maternal Psychological Distress With Fetal Brain Growth, Metabolism, and Cortical Maturation

Wu, Yao; Lu, Yuan-Chiao; Jacobs, Marni; Pradhan, Subechhya; Kapse, Kushal; Li, Zhao; Andescavage, Nickie; Vézina, Gilbert; Plessis, Adré J. du; Limperopoulos, Catherine

doi:10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2019.19940

Cited by 147 publications

(155 citation statements)

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“…Our GLM analyses regarding hippocampal volumes did not find any significant main effects of PPD or moderating effect by newborn sex. However, a recent study observed smaller fetal hippocampal volumes in both sexes after exposure to maternal anxiety between GW 24 to 40 ( Wu et al, 2020 ). Increased prenatal anxiety has also been connected to slower bilateral hippocampal growth during the first 6 months of life.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 93%

“…Evidence of a connection between PPD and altered cortical morphology is convincing in newborn and child studies ( Buss et al, 2010 , Lebel et al, 2016 , Qiu et al, 2015b , Sandman et al, 2012 , Sandman et al, 2015 ). However, the relationships between PPD and brain regions closely related to emotional, cognitive and memory functions – such as the amygdala and hippocampus ( Qiu et al, 2017 , Qiu et al, 2015a , Wen et al, 2017 , Wu et al, 2020 ) – are less studied. Alterations in these structures may explain attentional deficits and other behavioural problems in offspring ( Van den Bergh et al, 2018 ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Newborn amygdalar volumes are associated with maternal prenatal psychological distress in a sex-dependent way

Lehtola

Tuulari

Scheinin

et al. 2020

NeuroImage: Clinical

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Highlights Assessed relation of maternal prenatal distress to amygdalae and hippocampi volumes. Newborn amygdalar volumes negatively related to maternal prenatal distress in males. No association between maternal prenatal distress and newborn hippocampal volumes. Prenatal maternal distress seems to affect newborn brain in a sex-dependent way.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 93%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Newborn amygdalar volumes are associated with maternal prenatal psychological distress in a sex-dependent way

Lehtola

Tuulari

Scheinin

et al. 2020

NeuroImage: Clinical

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Previous studies have shown that pregnancy women who bear significantly psychological burden are more likely to develop mental disorders and impaired social function in the future 14 , 15 . Further, the mental problems during pregnancy can also adversely affect the cognitive, emotional, and physical development of children 16 – 18 . Therefore, more attentions should be paid to the mental health of this special population.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The prevalence of psychiatric symptoms of pregnant and non-pregnant women during the COVID-19 epidemic

et al. 2020

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Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is rapidly spreading worldwide, with a staggering number of cases and deaths. However, available data on the psychological impacts of COVID-19 on pregnant women are limited. The purposes of this study were to assess the prevalence of psychiatric symptoms among pregnant women, and to compare them with non-pregnant women. From February 28 to March 12, 2020, a cross-sectional study of pregnant and non-pregnant women was performed in China. The online questionnaire was used to collect information of participants. The mental health status was assessed by patient health questionnaire, generalized anxiety disorder scale, insomnia severity index, somatization subscale of the symptom checklist 90, and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) checklist-5. Totally, 859 respondents were enrolled, including 544 pregnant women and 315 non-pregnant women. In this study, 5.3%, 6.8%, 2.4%, 2.6%, and 0.9% of pregnant women were identified to have symptoms of depression, anxiety, physical discomfort, insomnia, and PTSD, respectively. However, the corresponding prevalence rates among non-pregnant women were 17.5%, 17.5%, 2.5%, 5.4%, 5.7%, respectively. After adjusting for other covariates, we observed that pregnancy was associated a reduced risk of symptoms of depression (OR = 0.23; 95% CI: 0.12–0.45), anxiety (OR = 0.26; 95% CI: 0.16–0.42), insomnia (OR = 0.19; 95% CI: 0.06–0.58), and PTSD (OR = 0.15; 95% CI: 0.04–0.53) during the COVID-19 epidemic. Our results indicate that during the COVID-19 epidemic in China, pregnant women have an advantage of facing mental problems caused by COVID-19, showing fewer depression, anxiety, insomnia, and PTSD symptoms than non-pregnant women.

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“…Sex differences in global, regional and brain tissue growth rates have been reported in fetuses and neonates, with male fetuses showing larger volumes and faster growth rates than female fetuses ( Wu et al, 2020 ; Gilmore et al, 2007 ). However, to date, no study has examined sex differences in fetal brain 1 H-MRS. Our study shows significantly lower metabolite concentrations for tCr (p = 0.02), and trend-level (p < 0.10) for tCh, tNAA and Ins in female fetuses during the 2nd trimester.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Non-invasive measurement of biochemical profiles in the healthy fetal brain

et al. 2020

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Proton magnetic resonance spectroscopy ( 1 H-MRS) of the fetal brain can be used to study emerging metabolite profiles in the developing brain. Identifying early deviations in brain metabolic profiles in high-risk fetuses may offer important adjunct clinical information to improve surveillance and management during pregnancy. Objective: To investigate the normative trajectory of the fetal brain metabolites during the second half of gestation, and to determine the impact of using different Cramer-Rao Lower Bounds (CRLB) threshold on metabolite measurements using magnetic resonance spectroscopy. Study design: We prospectively enrolled 219 pregnant women with normal fetal ultrasound and biometric measures. We performed a total of 331 fetal 1 H-MRS studies with gestational age in the rage of 18–39 weeks with 112 of the enrolled participants scanned twice. All the spectra in this study were acquired on a GE 1.5 T scanner using long echo-time of 144 ms and analyzed in LCModel. Results: We successfully acquired and analyzed fetal 1 H-MRS with a success rate of 93%. We observed increases in total NAA, total creatine, total choline, scyllo inositol and total NAA-to-total choline ratio with advancing GA. Our results also showed faster increases in total NAA and total NAA-to-total choline ratio during the third trimester compared to the second trimester. We also observed faster increases in total choline and total NAA in female fetuses. Increasing the Cramer-Rao lower bounds threshold progressively from 100% to 40%–20% increased the mean metabolite concentrations and decreased the number of observations available for analysis. Conclusion: We report serial fetal brain biochemical profiles in a large cohort of health fetuses studied twice in gestation with a high success rate in the second and third trimester of pregnancy. We present normative in-vivo fetal brain metabolite trajectories over a 21-week gestational period which can be used to non-invasively measure and monitor brain biochemistry in the healthy and high-risk fetus.

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Association of Prenatal Maternal Psychological Distress With Fetal Brain Growth, Metabolism, and Cortical Maturation

Cited by 147 publications

References 94 publications

Newborn amygdalar volumes are associated with maternal prenatal psychological distress in a sex-dependent way

Newborn amygdalar volumes are associated with maternal prenatal psychological distress in a sex-dependent way

The prevalence of psychiatric symptoms of pregnant and non-pregnant women during the COVID-19 epidemic

Non-invasive measurement of biochemical profiles in the healthy fetal brain

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