Abstracts
Diet, DNA and pregnancy complications
Denise Furness
PhD Student, University of Adelaide,
Discipline of Obstetrics and Gynaecology
Supervised through Human Nutrition, CSIRO; Obstetrics and Gynaecology, University of Adelaide and CYWHS
A variety of life-threatening and common pregnancy complications are associated with abnormal placental development during pregnancy. Currently, we cannot predict which women are likely to develop these complications. During placental and fetal development a large number of cells are making new copies of DNA. It is possible that abnormal development of the placenta and pregnancy complications, such as preeclampsia, may be caused by damaged DNA. These problems may also be associated with decreased levels of vitamins that are essential for healthy cells and the prevention of DNA damage (folate, vitamin-B12 and vitamin-B6) which may result in abnormal placental development. Therefore, this study aimed to determine to what extent DNA damage, folate, vitamin-B12 and vitamin-B6 were related to pregnancy complications that can cause great harm to the pregnant mother and her baby. The results from this study showed that an increase in DNA damage can be used as an early detection method in pregnant women that develop pregnancy complications, such as preeclampsia and IUGR. This increase in DNA damage was not seen in women who had normal healthy pregnancies. Therefore, this method may be used to predict these pregnancy complications in early pregnancy, which may reduce the severity or possibly prevent the development of common pregnancy complications.
