Original researchMaternal hemoglobin and risk of gestational diabetes mellitus in Chinese women
Section snippets
Materials and methods
Our hospital is a government-funded regional hospital with about 5000 deliveries per annum, and caters mainly to residents of Hong Kong who do not have to pay for antenatal care. The majority of our patients (more than 95%) is ethnic Chinese. A multivitamin preparation containing 29 mg of elemental iron is offered to all patients from 20 weeks’ gestation, but patients’ compliance is not monitored. At the first antenatal visit, maternal hemoglobin concentration, mean corpuscular volume, and
Results
The records of 865 women attending the clinic consecutively were screened, and 780 women who fulfilled the inclusion criteria were approached for recruitment, of whom 762 consented to be studied. However, the results of the serum ferritin and iron concentrations were not available in 32 women, leaving only 730 women in the final analysis. The 75th, 50th, and 25th percentile values of the initial visit hemoglobin concentration were 13.0 g/dL, 12.4 g/dL, and 11.5 g/dL, respectively, and the
Discussion
The measurement of hemoglobin at the first antenatal visit has become a standard investigation in the pregnant woman. This result could be useful for the identification of women who are at risk not only for complications, such as fetal growth restriction and preterm birth, but also for GDM if the association between high hemoglobin concentration and diabetes mellitus found in the nonpregnant woman can also be demonstrated during pregnancy.
In nonpregnant subjects, the association between high
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Present address for Louis Y. Chan, MBBS: Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Princess Margaret Hospital, Kowloon, Hong Kong, China.