Placental pathology predicts infantile physical development during first 18 months in Japanese population: Hamamatsu birth cohort for mothers and children (HBC Study)

The present study aimed to investigate the relationship between placental pathological findings and physiological development during the neonate and infantile periods. Study participants were 258 infants from singleton pregnancies enrolled in the Hamamatsu Birth Cohort for Mothers and Children (HBC Study) whose placentas were stored in our pathological division. They were followed up from birth to 18 months of age. Physiological development (body weight and the ponderal index [PI]) was assessed at 0, 1, 4, 6, 10, 14, and 18 months. Placental blocks were prepared by random sampling and eleven pathological findings were assessed, as follows: ‘Accelerated villous maturation’, ‘Decidual vasculopathy’, ‘Thrombosis or Intramural fibrin deposition’, ‘Avascular villi’, ‘Delayed villous maturation’, ‘Maternal inflammatory response’, ‘Fetal inflammatory response’, ‘Villitis of unknown etiology (VUE)’, ‘Deciduitis’, ‘Maternal vascular malperfusion’, and ‘Fetal vascular malperfusion’. Mixed model analysis with the use of the xtmixed command by the generic statistical software, Stata version 13.1., identified ‘Accelerated villous maturation’ and ‘Maternal vascular malperfusion’ as significant predictors of a lower body weight and ‘Deciduitis’ as a significant predictor of a small PI, throughout the first 18 months of life. In conclusion, the present study is the first to demonstrate that some pathological findings of the placenta are associated with changes in infantile physical development during the initial 18 months of life in the Japanese population.