Are you currently expecting and not having the easiest pregnancy? Then chances are you could be having a baby boy – at least if a recent study is to be believed.
According to new research published in Health Day, women carrying baby boys are more likely to experience pregnancy complications than those carrying baby girls.
For their findings, the researchers from the Robinson Research Institute at the University of Adelaide in Australia analyzed more than half a million Australian births—574,000, to be exact—over a 30 year period between 1981 and 2011.
According to the researchers, birth complications can include gestational diabetes, preeclampsia (a serious high blood pressure condition), and premature childbirth. And what their lengthy study showed, was that compared to baby girls, boys are 27 percent more likely to be born prematurely between 20 and 24 weeks’ gestation, and 17 percent more likely at 34 to 36 weeks.
As well as this, women carrying boys were four percent more likely to experience gestational diabetes, and 7.5 percent more likely to have preeclampsia, according to the new findings.
“The sex of the baby has a direct association with pregnancy complications,” said lead author of the study Dr. Petra Verburg. And while the reasons aren’t entirely clear, Verburg suspects that “there are likely to be genetic factors” at play.
In terms of what can be taken from the results of this study, Verburg believes it more so than anything emphasizes the importance of prenatal care at the beginning of pregnancy, when there is “still a window of opportunity for a woman to reduce her risks for pregnancy complications.”
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