Abstract
Background: Several studies focus on the effects of prenatal stress in adulthood. Relatively little is known about the early neurodevelopmental consequences of such experiences and their predictive value. Thus we examined the early neurobehavioral responses of offspring whose mothers were exposed to restraint stress. Methods and results: Pregnant rats were exposed to 60 minutes restraint stress twice a day for seven days in different periods of pregnancy (early/mid and late phase). After birth, offspring were examined for the maturation of neural signs and reflexes daily for 3 weeks. Mid-pregnancy stress resulted in a subtle faster development in the appearance of eyelid and auditory startle reflexes, and in the disappearance of crossed extensor reflex. Pups exposed to stress in the last week of intrauterine life displayed a delay in air righting and showed a slight enhancement in the appearance of auditory startle. Conclusion: Based on our present findings, the deleterious consequences of prenatal stress are not apparent during the early developmental stages at least not detectable with the battery of test most widely used to examine neurobehavioral development. However, these findings draw the attention of the need of careful awareness in later ages in spite of the normal neurobehavioral development of newborns exposed to prenatal stress.
Highlights
Recent studies have raised the attention that the origin of future health disturbances may lie in fetal development and early pre- and postnatal environment
Barros et al observed a long-lasting astroglial reaction, a reduced dendritic arborization and loss of synapses in the brain of adult offspring suffering intrauterine stress during the last week of pregnancy [13]. It is common in human prenatal stress literature that preterm delivery, reduced birth weight and infant temperament problems such as irritability, sleeping and feeding difficulties are associated with maternal anxiety/stress
We have previously described that perinatal hypoxic and toxic injuries remarkably delay the neurobehavioral development but 3-hr-long maternal separation induces only slight changes [31,32,33,34]
Summary
Recent studies have raised the attention that the origin of future health disturbances may lie in fetal development and early pre- and postnatal environment. Animal experiments suggest that maternal stress may lead to decreased functioning of 11β-HSD2 enzyme resulting in high amount of glucocorticoids affecting the developing brain [3,5,6,7] They might have detrimental effects on cell proliferation, differentiation and synapse formation, mainly in amygdala, hippocampus and limbic cortical areas leading to short- and long-term postnatal consequences [8,9,10,11,12]. Conclusion: Based on our present findings, the deleterious consequences of prenatal stress are not apparent during the early developmental stages at least not detectable with the battery of test most widely used to examine neurobehavioral development These findings draw the attention of the need of careful awareness in later ages in spite of the normal neurobehavioral development of newborns exposed to prenatal stress.
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