Maternal Socioeconomic Factors and Racial/Ethnic Differences in Neonatal Anthropometry

Abstract

Disparities in birthweight by maternal race/ethnicity are commonly observed. It is unclear to what extent these disparities are correlates of individual socioeconomic factors. In a prospective cohort of 1645 low-risk singleton pregnancies included in the NICHD Fetal Growth Study (2009–2013), neonatal anthropometry was measured by trained personnel using a standard protocol. Socioeconomic characteristics included employment status, marital status, health insurance, annual income, and education. Separate adjusted generalized linear models were fit to both test the effect of race/ethnicity and the interaction of race/ethnicity and socioeconomic characteristics on neonatal anthropometry. Mean infant birthweight, length, head circumference, and abdominal circumference all differed by race/ethnicity (p < 0.001). We observed no statistically significant interactions between race/ethnicity and full-time employment/student status, marital status, insurance, or education in association with birthweight, neonatal exam weight, length, or head or abdominal circumference at examination. The interaction between income and race/ethnicity was significant only for abdominal circumference (p = 0.027), with no other significant interactions for other growth parameters, suggesting that racial/ethnic differences in neonatal anthropometry did not vary by individual socioeconomic factors in low-risk women. Our results do not preclude structural factors, such as lifetime exposure to poverty, as an explanation for racial/ethnic disparities.

Predictors of Phthalate Metabolites Exposure among Healthy Pregnant Women in the United States, 2010–2015

“…It is also important to evaluate a range of PthMs and identify what the distribution and differences in predictors may (or may not) be among a large, diverse population as this perspective is not well understood in the literature. Further, less is known about the effects of newer phthalate replacement compounds and their effect on human health [11,18,19]. Here, we use longitudinal data from eight clinical centers across the United States (US) to investigate predictors of a wide range of PthM concentrations (including newer replacement phthalates) throughout pregnancy among a large, diverse cohort of healthy nulliparous individuals with singleton pregnancies.…”