UCI Joining $2-Million Search for Stress / Prematurity Link

UC Irvine researchers will participate in a $2-million grant from the National Institutes of Child Health and Development to study the possible link between a mother’s stress and premature births, officials announced this week.

Their goal is to find a way to predict and prevent premature births.

Curt Sandman, a UCI professor of psychiatry and human behavior, and his team of researchers will conduct a five-year study with as many as 600 women to further examine the association between a stress-related peptide called CRH, for corticotropin-releasing hormone, and prematurity.

Preterm birth, which occurs in about 10% of all pregnancies, is associated with 75% of all infant deaths. By age 2, up to one-third of premature children suffer sensory handicaps such as cerebral palsy, mental retardation, epilepsy, blindness and deafness, Sandman said.

Sandman and his team have been conducting research for more than a decade into the link between preterm birth and the level of CRH in the mother’s blood during pregnancy.

He says they will use the grant to conduct a study--their largest to date and possibly the largest ever of its kind--to confirm earlier findings and studies.

The mothers will be given blood tests measuring CRH levels five times during their pregnancy and once after delivery.

They also will complete extensive questionnaires on the sources of psychological stress in their environment and how they are reacting to them.

“It may be that psychological stress experienced early in pregnancy leads to an abnormally rapid rise of CRH that triggers premature birth,” Sandman said.

“If we can confirm that connection, we may be able to prevent premature births by taking steps to reduce stress during pregnancy.”

Researchers from UCLA and the University of Kentucky also are participating in the grant.