Study Shows Risk of Low Cholesterol During Pregnancy

According to research, pregnant white women who have abnormally low cholesterol levels, are 21 percent more likely to give birth prematurely than black women with low cholesterol. “It appears that too little cholesterol may be as bad as too much cholesterol during pregnancy,” explains Dr. Max Muenke from the National Human Genome Research Institute.

The Statistics

A recent report from the National Academy of Sciences recently reported that one in eight infants in the U.S. are born prematurely. Infants who are born prematurely have a high risk for developing cerebral palsy and other disorders. One-third of the infants born prematurely reportedly die immediately after birth or in the first month of their lives.

Study Conducted

A study that was recently conducted by Muenke and his colleagues, studied 9,938 women from South Carolina. The researchers separated 118 of the women who had low cholesterol into one group while the other 940 women had higher levels and were put into another group to be analyzed. They found that among the women who had low cholesterol, 12.7 percent had preterm deliveries. Twenty-one percent of those who gave birth prematurely were white, while only five percent were black. (Source: Los Angeles Times) Do you have a child that was born prematurely and as a result has cerebral palsy? If so, please contact us today to speak with an experienced birth injury attorney who will ensure that you are compensated for any wrongdoing that was done during the delivery.