Maternal immune markers during pregnancy and child neurodevelopmental outcomes at age 20 months in the Seychelles Child Development Study

Abstract

Immune dysregulation during pregnancy may influence behavior and neurodevelopment in offspring, but few human studies have tested this hypothesis. Using structural equation modeling, we examined associations between maternal inflammatory markers at 28 weeks gestation and child neurodevelopmental outcomes at 20 months of age in a sample of 1453 mother-child pairs. We observed several associations between maternal inflammatory markers measured in the late second or early third trimester and child neurodevelopmental outcomes. The direction of association for some markers was unexpected. Further research is warranted to confirm and elucidate the exact nature of these findings.

Keywords: Children; Developmental outcomes; Inflammatory markers; Pregnancy.