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Review
. 2023 Dec 14;12(24):7686.
doi: 10.3390/jcm12247686.

Chronic Stress in Pregnancy Is Associated with Low Birth Weight: A Meta-Analysis

Alkis Matsas  1 , Panagiota Panopoulou  1 , Neofyta Antoniou  2 , Alexandra Bargiota  3 , Alexandros Gryparis  4 , Nikolaos Vrachnis  2 , George Mastorakos  1 , Sophia N Kalantaridou  2 , Theodoros Panoskaltsis  1 , Nikos F Vlahos  1 , Georgios Valsamakis  1   3
Affiliations
Review

Chronic Stress in Pregnancy Is Associated with Low Birth Weight: A Meta-Analysis

Alkis Matsas et al. J Clin Med. .

Abstract

Background and objectives: Chronic activation of the stress system has cumulative effects on the body, and it places individuals at risk for adverse health outcomes. Chronic stress has been assessed by health questionnaires in pregnancy. During the perinatal period, mothers experience increased physical and emotional demands. Chronic stress interferes with hormonal functions in mothers and infants. This meta-analysis studies the effect of maternal chronic stress during pregnancy, as assessed by established stress questionnaires, on the birth weight of their full-term infants.

Design and methods: According to our criteria and after research collection, we obtained 107 studies and we conducted two types of analyses: a logistic (N = 22,342) and linear regression analysis (N = 7431).

Results: Our results show that chronic stress is associated with a statistically significant risk of low birth weight (OR = 1.50, CI 95% = [1.13; 1.99], p ≤ 0.02).

Conclusions: Increased maternal chronic stress, as assessed by questionnaires, in pregnancy is associated with a low-birth-weight baby. The above meta-analysis indicates that maternal high chronic stress questionnaire scores could be used as a clinical tool in order to assess low-birth-weight risk.

Keywords: birth weight; chronic stress; perinatal period; pregnancy; stress questionnaires.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors report no conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Preferred reporting items for systematic reviews and meta-analysis (PRISMA).
Figure 2
Figure 2
Results of logistic regression analysis [10,11,23,24,25,26,27,28,29].
Figure 3
Figure 3
Results of linear regression analysis [30,31,32].
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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