Fetal Growth and Acute Childhood Leukemia: Looking Beyond Birth Weight.
From: Telethon Institute for Child Health Research, Centre for Child Health Research, University of Western Australia, Perth, Western Australia. lizm@ichr.uwa.edu.au
American journal of epidemiology
- Publish Date: Jul 2007
- ISSN: 0002-9262
- Volume: 166
- Issue: 2
- Pages: 151-9
- Medium: Print
- Language: English
- Citation (JAMA): Milne Elizabeth, Laurvick Crystal L, Blair Eve, et al. Fetal Growth and Acute Childhood Leukemia: Looking Beyond Birth Weight.. Am. J. Epidemiol. Jul 2007;166:151-9
Abstract
The authors examined the relation between birth weight, intrauterine growth, and risk of childhood leukemia using population-based linked health data from Western Australia. A cohort of 576,593 infants born in 1980-2004 were followed from birth to diagnosis of acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) (n = 243) or acute myeloid leukemia (AML) (n = 36) before their 15th birthday, death, or the end of follow-up (December 31, 2005). Data were analyzed using Cox regression. Risk of ALL was positively associated with the proportion of optimal birth weight — a measure of the appropriateness of fetal growth — particularly among children younger than 5 years; the hazard ratio for a 1-standard-deviation increase in proportion of optimal birth weight was 1.25 (95% confidence interval: 1.07, 1.47). Among children younger than 5 years not classified as having high birth weight (defined as >3,500 g, >3,800 g, and >4,000 g), a 1-unit increase in proportion of optimal birth weight was associated with an approximately 40% increase in ALL risk. This suggests that accelerated growth, rather than high birth weight per se, is involved in the etiology of ALL. These findings are consistent with a role for insulin-like growth factor I in the causal pathway. Findings for AML were inconclusive, probably because of small numbers.
Mesh Headings (Keywords): Adolescent, Birth Weight, Child, Child, Preschool, Epidemiologic Methods, Female, Fetal Development, Gestational Age, Humans, Infant, Infant, Newborn, Insulin-Like Growth Factor I, Leukemia, Myeloid, Acute, Male, Medical Record Linkage, Precursor Cell Lymphoblastic Leukemia-Lymphoma, Proportional Hazards Models, Risk Factors, Western Australia
Check for Full Text / PubMed Unique Identifier (PMID): 17443021
This abstract is part of PubMed, a service of the U.S. National Library of Medicine. PubMed includes more than 17 million citations from MEDLINE and other life science journals for biomedical articles. See Copyright and Disclaimers.
Linked medical terms appearing on this page are added by Healia to help readers find more information and are not part of the original PubMed document.
The data herein was last updated on July 8th, 2008 and may not reflect the most current and accurate data available from NLM.