Overweight mothers tend to have bigger babies: study

[Photo/Xinhua]

Mothers who are overweight or obese during pregnancy are more likely to give birth to bigger babies, new research suggested Tuesday.

The study, published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, also found that mothers with higher blood sugar tend to have larger babies, even within a healthy range.

Conversely, having higher blood pressure in pregnancy causes babies to be smaller, according to the study led by the universities of Exeter and Bristol.

"Being born very large or very small can carry health risks for a newborn baby, particularly when that's at the extreme end of the spectrum," Rachel Freathy, of the University of Exeter Medical School, who co-led the study, said in a statement.

"Higher and lower birth weights are also associated with diseases such as Type 2 diabetes later on in life. Understanding which characteristics of a mother influence the birth weight of her offspring, may eventually help us to tailor management of a healthy pregnancy and reduce the number of babies born too large or too small."

The researchers used data from more than 30,000 healthy women and their babies across 18 studies.

They examined genetic variants associated with mothers' body mass index, blood sugar, lipid or fat levels and blood pressure, along with measurements of those characteristics in pregnancy and the weight of all the babies at birth.