Abstract
We aimed to provide a summary of the existing published knowledge on the association between adverse birth outcomes and the development of wheezing during the first two years of life. We carried out a systematic review of epidemiological studies within the MEDLINE database. Epidemiological studies on human subjects, published in English, were included in the review. A comprehensive literature search yielded 72 studies for further consideration. Following the application of the eligibility criteria we identified nine studies. A positive association and an excess risk of wheezing during the first two years of life were revealed for adverse birth outcomes.
Highlights
A number of maternal and lifestyle factors have been shown to be associated with the occurrence of wheezing or diagnosed asthma in childhood and adolescence, such as maternal age [1], maternal smoking before birth and exposure to secondhand smoke (SHS) [2,3]
Born children are known to have more respiratory symptoms during their first years of life than children born full-term [10,11,12,13] and their lung function at school age has been shown to be significantly reduced [14,15,16,17] especially among the children who had bronchopulmonary dysplasia at birth [14,18,19].Taking the above into account both prematurity and low birth weight are considered significant risk factors for the development of childhood wheezing and asthma, even if the aetiology and the mechanism by which adverse birth outcomes predispose to wheezing is not known [20,21,22]
Nine studies were deemed suitable for inclusion in the review one study included two sub-studies [24] and as a result we considered ten studies as the final number included in the systematic review
Summary
A number of maternal and lifestyle factors have been shown to be associated with the occurrence of wheezing or diagnosed asthma in childhood and adolescence, such as maternal age [1], maternal smoking before birth and exposure to secondhand smoke (SHS) [2,3]. Low maternal age and early bottle feeding are associated with lower respiratory tract illness in the first 2 years of life, along with environmental exposures such as dampness [4,5] which, in turn, are linked with the development of asthma in childhood [6]. This evidence suggests that exposures occurring during pregnancy and early childhood can influence the risk of respiratory signs, such as wheezing in early childhood, or asthma later on in life. Taking the above into account, this systematic review aims to summarize the existing published scientific knowledge regarding the association between adverse birth outcomes and the development of wheezing during the first two years of life
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