Related Experiment Video

Updated: Feb 9, 2026

Assessment of Maternal Vascular Remodeling During Pregnancy in the Mouse Uterus
06:55

Assessment of Maternal Vascular Remodeling During Pregnancy in the Mouse Uterus

Published on: December 5, 2015

14.2K

Maternal thyroid disorder in pregnancy and risk of cerebral palsy in the child: a population-based cohort study

Tanja Gram Petersen1, Anne-Marie Nybo Andersen2, Peter Uldall3

  • 1Section of Social Medicine, Department of Public Health, University of Copenhagen, Gothersgade 160, 1123, Copenhagen, Denmark. tagp@sund.ku.dk.

BMC Pediatrics
|June 2, 2018
PubMed

Insights

Maternal thyroid disorder during pregnancy may increase the risk of unilateral spastic cerebral palsy in children. However, overall maternal thyroid issues were not linked to bilateral spastic cerebral palsy.

Area of Science:

  • Pediatric neurology
  • Endocrinology
  • Epidemiology

Background:

  • Cerebral palsy is the most common childhood motor disability, with largely unknown causes.
  • Prenatal thyroid hormone disturbances are hypothesized to increase cerebral palsy risk.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To investigate the association between maternal thyroid disorder and the risk of cerebral palsy in offspring.

Main Methods:

  • Population-based cohort study involving over 1.4 million children from Denmark and the Nordic countries (MOBAND).
  • Utilized register-based and self-reported maternal thyroid disorder data.
  • Analyzed risk of cerebral palsy and its subtypes using logistic regression, with follow-up to age 6.

Main Results:

  • Maternal thyroid disorder was not associated with bilateral spastic cerebral palsy (OR 1.0; 95% CI: 0.7-1.5).
  • Maternal thyroid disorder identified during pregnancy showed an association with increased risk of unilateral spastic cerebral palsy (OR 3.1; 95% CI: 1.2-8.4).
  • In the MOBAND cohort, self-reported maternal thyroid disorder in pregnancy was not significantly associated with overall cerebral palsy risk (OR 1.2; 95% CI: 0.6-2.4).

Conclusions:

  • Maternal thyroid disorder during pregnancy is linked to an elevated risk of unilateral spastic cerebral palsy.
  • No association was found between overall maternal thyroid disorder and bilateral spastic cerebral palsy.
  • Further research using maternal blood samples is recommended to validate these findings.
Abstract

Keywords:
Cerebral palsyMaternal thyroid disorderPregnancyPrenatal exposureRegister-based cohortThe Danish National Birth CohortThe Norwegian mother and child cohort study

More Related Videos

Author Spotlight: Exploring the Potential of Massage Therapy in Cerebral Palsy Using Animal Models08:24

Author Spotlight: Exploring the Potential of Massage Therapy in Cerebral Palsy Using Animal Models

Published on: August 11, 2023

2.7K
Event-related Potentials During Target-response Tasks to Study Cognitive Processes of Upper Limb Use in Children with Unilateral Cerebral Palsy08:26

Event-related Potentials During Target-response Tasks to Study Cognitive Processes of Upper Limb Use in Children with Unilateral Cerebral Palsy

Published on: January 11, 2016

12.6K

Related Concept Videos

Conservation of Small Populations02:04

Conservation of Small Populations

Small population sizes put a species at extreme risk of extinction due to a lack of variation, and a consequent decrease in adaptability. This weakens the chances of survival under pressures such as climate change, competition from other species, or new diseases. Large populations are more likely to survive pressures such as these, as such populations are more likely to harbor individuals that have genetic variants that are adaptive under new stresses. Small populations are much less...
17.4K
Disorders of Acid-Base Balance01:29

Disorders of Acid-Base Balance

The human body maintains a precise pH range of arterial blood between 7.35 and 7.45. Deviations result in either acidosis (pH < 7.35) or alkalosis (pH > 7.45). These conditions are further classified as respiratory or metabolic disorders based on their underlying cause.
Respiratory Acidosis and Alkalosis
Respiratory acidosis occurs due to an increase in the partial pressure of carbon dioxide PCO2 in the blood. It often arises from shallow breathing or impaired gas exchange caused by...
2.1K
What is Population Genetics?01:25

What is Population Genetics?

A population is composed of members of the same species that simultaneously live and interact in the same area. When individuals in a population breed, they pass down their genes to their offspring. Many of these genes are polymorphic, meaning that they occur in multiple variants. Such variations of a gene are referred to as alleles. The collective set of all the alleles within a population is known as the gene pool.
64.9K
The Thyroid Gland01:23

The Thyroid Gland

The thyroid gland is a small, butterfly-shaped gland located in the neck and covers the anterior surface of the trachea. The gland has two lateral lobes connected by a thin tissue mass called the isthmus. Internally, each lobe comprises many small spherical structures known as thyroid follicles, surrounded by a network of blood vessels.
The follicles have a central cavity lined by simple cuboidal to squamous epithelial cells called follicular cells. These cells produce the glycoprotein...
7.7K
What are Populations and Communities?00:30

What are Populations and Communities?

Overview
38.0K
Population Growth00:57

Population Growth

Population size is dynamic, increasing with birth rates and immigration, and decreasing with death rates and emigration. In ideal conditions with unlimited resources, populations can increase exponentially, which plots as a J-shaped growth rate curve of population size against time. This type of curve is characteristic of newly-introduced invasive species, or populations that have suffered catastrophic declines and are rebounding.
28.7K