PT  - JOURNAL ARTICLE
AU  - Teresa To
AU  - Jun Guan
AU  - Chengning Wang
AU  - Dhenuka Radhakrishnan
AU  - Susan McLimont
AU  - Oxana Latycheva
AU  - Andrea S Gershon
TI  - Is large birth weight associated with asthma risk in early childhood?
AID  - 10.1136/adc.2010.187047
DP  - 2012 Feb 01
TA  - Archives of Disease in Childhood
PG  - 169--171
VI  - 97
IP  - 2
4099  - http://adc.bmj.com/content/97/2/169.short
4100  - http://adc.bmj.com/content/97/2/169.full
SO  - Arch Dis Child2012 Feb 01; 97
AB  - Objective To determine the association between large birth weight and the risk of developing asthma in early childhood. Methods All single live births (n=687 194) born in Ontario between 1 April 1995 and 31 March 2001 were followed until their sixth birthday. Their birth weight was categorised as low (<2.5 kg), normal (2.5–4.5 kg), large (4.6–6.5 kg) or extremely large (>6.5 kg). Poisson regression analysis was used. Results Compared with normal-birth-weight infants, large-birth-weight infants (2.3% of total) had a slightly lower risk of developing asthma by age 6 after adjusting for confounders (adjusted RR 0.90, 95% CI 0.86 to 0.93). There was a trend towards increased risk of asthma among extremely large-birth-weight infants (RR 1.21, 95% CI 0.67 to 2.19). Conclusions Contrary to previous reports, large birth weight was associated with a lower risk for asthma. Instead, a trend towards increased risk of asthma was observed among extremely large-birth-weight infants and interventions to reduce the incidence of extreme large birth weight may help reduce the risk of asthma.