Endocrine Abstracts

Background: Maternal obesity in pregnancy associates with higher birthweight. A key pathway is through placental regulation of hormones controlling foetal growth. As excess foetal glucocorticoid exposure associates with lower birthweight and since placental Insulin-like Growth Factor (IGF2) may be modulated by glucocorticoids, we hypothesised that the expression profiles of placental genes leading to reduced glucocorticoid exposure and increased IGF2 mRNA level correlate with ...

Introduction: Maternal distress, including poorer life satisfaction, increased anxiety and depression (A&D) symptoms, are worse in Severely Obese (SO) than lean pregnancy and may alter placental genes regulating foetal glucocorticoid exposure and placental growth. We hypothesised that the associations between increased maternal distress with changes in placental mRNA levels leading to a reduced placental barrier to maternal glucocorticoids, and altered placental IGF2, are ...

Background: One in five women is obese at antenatal booking. Maternal obesity increases risk of offspring complications including higher birthweight. We hypothesised that this is mediated by altered action of maternal glucocorticoids, key regulators of fetal growth and development. We compared cortisol levels during pregnancy and placental glucocorticoid sensitivity in obese and lean women.Methods: With ethical approval serum cortisol levels were measure...

Introduction: Labour is an inflammatory process involving the innate immune system, premature activation of which, for example by infection, can lead to preterm birth before 37 weeks of gestation with profound pathophysiological consequences for the offspring. The putative antimicrobial protein HRPE773 (ZG16B) expressed in human female reproductive secretory epithelia, has been shown previously to be elevated in human endometrium during the menstrual early secretory phase and ...

Background: Maternal obesity during pregnancy is associated with adverse effects on fetal growth and development. As the placenta is a key organ regulating fetal growth, we hypothesized that maternal obesity is associated with altered placental expression and DNA methylation of genes regulating fetal growth and glucocorticoid metabolism and aimed to investigate this in first trimester (F; <12 weeks gestation) and term (T;>37 weeks gestation) placental tissues.<p cl...