Cord blood α-fetoprotein concentrations in term newborns of smoking mothers

Abstract

The absence of a correlation between erythropoietin and birth weight or length and the negative correlations between alpha-fetoprotein and these anthropometric parameters suggest that the intra-uterine growth retardation caused by maternal smoking is not due to tissue hypoxia, but that both growth retardation and elevated alpha-fetoprotein result from the direct or indirect toxic effect of a factor(s) present in tobacco smoke.

Maternal Serum Transformed α-Fetoprotein Levels in Women with Intrauterine Growth Retardation

“…This result could suggest that increased t-AFP levels may be present in any situation in which fetal growth is seriously affected regardless of the cause of the condition. Along this line, Beratis et al [10] found that the increased cord serum AFP levels in newborns with IUGR associated with maternal smoking were not associated to fetal hypoxia (as there was no correlation between erythropoietin levels and birth weight), suggesting that elevations of cord serum AFP were associated to the direct or indirect toxic effect of a factor(s) present in tobacco smoke causing growth retardation. However, we also found that elevations of maternal serum t-AFP levels are especially marked in cases of fetuses with fetal chronic hypoxia suggested by the presence of hemodynamic redistribution.…”

“…However, this hypothesis can hardly explain two facts: (1) The inverse correlation between fetal (umbilical cord) AFP levels and birth weight [10][11][12] ; (2) MSAFP increases several weeks before both IUGR and any kind of placental lesions are manifest even though it has been speculated that these placental pathological changes can have their origin in the second trimester, although they are not evident until later in pregnancy [13] . In addition, in situations in which there is a clear placental abnormality that may lead to MSAFP elevations such as placental separation, stratified analyses have demonstrated that elevations of MSAFP and early gestation bleeding are independent predictors of low birth weight infants [14] .…”

Course of growth during the first 6 years in children exposed in utero to tobacco smoke

“…Intrauterine exposure to tobacco smoke causes several endocrine abnormalities in neonates [3,4,16,21]. Chronic fetal hypoxia, as indicated by increased erythropoietin concentrations [3,21] and reduced concentrations of leptin [16,22], could cause intrauterine growth retardation.…”

Congenital immature teratoma originating from the jejunum

“…The serum level of AFP, as a tumor marker of teratoma, was as high as 61 ± 44.8 μg/mL [5] or 57.7 ± 37.2 ng/mL [6] in newborns. A regression analysis of serum AFP levels in healthy infants showed that the levels regress according the equation of log Y = 7.397−2.622 · log (X + 10), where X = age in days and Y = AFP level in nanogram per milliliter, and descend to reference range (b20 ng/mL) at the age of 6 to 7 months [7].…”