Browsing by Subject "middle age"

Both prenatal hyperglycaemia (caused by maternal diabetes mellitus) and neonatal hypoglycaemia pose a risk to the neurocognitive development of the child: Maternal diabetes mellitus in pregnancy has been reported to be associated with impairments in memory functions of the offspring up to adolescence. Also, an association has been reported between neonatal hypoglycaemia and neurodevelopmental impairments in childhood and adolescence. However, to our knowledge, the association of prenatal hyperglycaemia with memory impairments has not previously been studied in adulthood. As for the possible association of neonatal hypoglycaemia with memory impairments, it has not, to our knowledge, been studied at any age. Furthermore, the separate and combined sequelae of the two risk factors are yet to be directly compared. We hypothesized that the two risk factors, separately and combined, would still in middle age be associated with subtle memory impairments. We assessed memory functions in a follow-up study of a cohort born during 1971–1974 and prospectively studied from birth. The sample included participants exposed to prenatal hyperglycaemia (n = 22), neonatal hypoglycaemia (n = 14), or both (n = 7). It also included controls with no early risks (n = 40). We assessed the participants' memory functions comprehensively, including working memory and immediate and delayed recall of both verbal and visual material. We found an interaction of early risk with the type of digit span task, a measure of working memory: The differences between span task scores varied between the groups. However, no pairwise between-group differences were significant. Thus, the interaction was not specific to any particular groups and likely to be clinically irrelevant. The interaction was non-significant when gestational age and birth weight were controlled for. The early risks were unassociated with scores on other memory tasks. Against our hypotheses, our results suggest that prenatal hyperglycaemia, neonatal hypoglycaemia and their combination are relatively benign disorders, especially when not accompanied by other perinatal complications: The association of prenatal hyperglycaemia with neurocognitive impairments appears to be attenuated in adulthood, and neonatal hypoglycaemia appears to have few long-term sequelae.