Relationship between obesity, ethnicity and risk of late stillbirth: a case control study

Stillbirth remains a common and devastating pregnancy complication. Approximately 8 in 1000 New Zealand births result in stillbirth (fetal death ≥ 20 weeks gestation) and more than 1 in 300 result in late stillbirth (death ≥ 28 weeks gestation)[1]. Unfortunately the decline in stillbirth rate in New Zealand and elsewhere that occurred in the 1980's and 1990's has not been sustained in the last decade [1–4].

Previous retrospective New Zealand studies have documented ethnic disparity in the rate of stillbirth, with Pacific women having an increased risk of stillbirth compared to European women [5, 6]. Ethnic disparity in stillbirth risk has also been reported elsewhere. In the UK, both Black and Asian women have a disproportionate number of stillbirths compared to White women [4, 7, 8]. In the United States, African American women have more than twice the risk of stillbirth compared to White women [9, 10]. The reasons for these reported ethnic disparities have not yet been determined.

International studies have reported several demographic risk factors associated with stillbirth, including; advanced maternal age [11, 12], obesity [13, 14] smoking in pregnancy [15], low socio-economic status [16] and extremes of parity [17, 18]. Many previous studies that have reported ethnic disparity in the risk of stillbirth were retrospective in design and had insufficient variables to enable appropriate adjustment for confounders [6, 7, 9].

The main aim of the prospective Auckland Stillbirth Study was to identify modifiable risk factors for late stillbirth. We hypothesised that, after adjustment for demographic risk factors, the risk of late stillbirth amongst Pacific women would not differ from that in European women and that obesity would be an independent risk factor for late stillbirth.

All women booked to give birth in the greater Auckland region and who experienced a stillbirth at or after 28 weeks gestation between July 2006 and June 2009 were eligible to participate in the study. Late stillbirth was selected as the primary outcome as live born babies born at or after 28 weeks are likely to survive. Women with multiple pregnancies and those where the baby died due to a congenital abnormality were excluded. Each case was matched with two randomly selected controls with an ongoing pregnancy at the same gestation at which the stillbirth occurred. A description of the manner in which cases and controls were identified and recruited, and other detailed methods have been described previously [19]. Data were obtained through interviewer administered questionnaires and from clinical data extraction.

Ethical approval was gained for this study from the Northern "X" Regional Ethics Committee.

During the study period 215 eligible cases of late stillbirth were identified, 155 (72%) consented to take part in the study, as did 310/429 (72%) of the eligible controls. No significant difference was identified between the characteristics of those who consented and those who did not [19].

Women who were; grandmultiparous (parity ≥4), not married, lived in the most deprived areas, or were not in paid work were also found to be at increased risk of late stillbirth. Both cigarette smokers and non smokers regularly exposed to environmental cigarette smoke had a similar degree of increased risk. Recreational drug use was associated with a greater than twofold increase in risk. Marijuana was the most commonly used recreational drug in pregnancy in 9 (5.8%) cases and 11 (3.6%) controls, and the majority of marijuana smokers also smoked cigarettes; 82% of marijuana smoking cases and 100% of marijuana smoking controls also smoked cigarettes.

In this study, no significant relationship was found between risk of late stillbirth and maternal age, country of birth or school leaving age. Previous adverse pregnancy outcome was not found to be significantly associated with late stillbirth risk in this study.

Auckland, the largest city in New Zealand, contains the greatest numbers of Pacific people of any city in the world [27]. The increased rate of late stillbirth amongst Pacific women compared to European found in univariable analysis is consistent with previous studies from New Zealand and with other international studies indicating ethnic disparity in stillbirth risk [4, 9, 28, 29]. This study was able to adjust for a number of potential demographic confounders such as obesity, parity and poverty. After this adjustment, Pacific ethnicity was no longer found to be independently associated with an increased risk of late stillbirth.

The results from this study also suggest that after adjusting for known confounding factors, Maori ethnicity was associated with a reduced risk of late stillbirth. This finding seems inconsistent with two other studies which reported that Maori women had a similar overall stillbirth risk to European women [6, 28], although these former studies were not able to adjust for BMI, smoking or drug use in pregnancy. There is also evidence that Maori women may have an increased risk of stillbirth prior to 28 weeks gestation, rather than late stillbirth [30]. Our findings of a reduced rate of late stillbirth in Maori, when considered with other New Zealand data suggesting an increase in early stillbirth, are compatible with the previous studies which showed no overall increase in stillbirth risk for Maori compared with European [6, 28]. However our data suggest that Maori women who do not have lifestyle risk factors may have a reduced risk of late stillbirth, and future well designed studies are needed to confirm or refute these findings.

Consistent with previous research, we found a twofold increase in late stillbirth risk in obese women [13, 14, 31, 32]. Obesity is particularly prevalent amongst Pacific women in New Zealand, with almost 64% of all Pacific women being classified as obese [33]. Obesity is also more prevalent in African Americans compared to White women in the United States [34]. Few previous studies showing disparity in stillbirth risk between ethnic groups have been able to adjust for BMI [9, 28]. One study, by Salihu and others, which has explored this relationship, reported that obesity compounded the stillbirth risk for African American women, as the increased risk of stillbirth for obese African American women was on average 50% greater than that for obese White women [32].

A novel feature of this study is that we have investigated the risk of stillbirth using ethnic specific as well as conventional WHO BMI criteria. The relationship between obesity and stillbirth was similar regardless of which criteria were used.

The mechanism(s) by which obesity increases the risk of stillbirth is not clear and is likely multifactorial. Metabolic disorders such as diabetes and pre-eclampsia are associated with obesity [35], and are in turn associated with an increased risk of stillbirth [36]; however in our study adjustment for these factors did not diminish the independent effect of obesity. Obese pregnant women have altered metabolic profiles compared with non obese women, including higher glucose levels (even when not meeting criteria for diabetes), altered lipids and a pro-inflammatory milieu [37]. In high income countries, obesity is associated with lower socio-economic status, and women who do not have access to micronutrient rich food have been found to be more likely to be overweight or obese [38]. In this study, however, adjustment for socio-economic status did not reduce the effect of obesity on the risk of stillbirth. Further research is required to determine whether nutritional status has an impact on the risk of stillbirth [39]. Obese pregnant women have significantly more sleep-related disordered breathing than normal weight women [40]. Snoring has been associated with fetal growth restriction and pregnancy-induced hypertension [41], but there has been only one case study reported that suggested a link between obstructive sleep apnoea and stillbirth [42]. Obesity has also been associated with altered perception of fetal movements, with more overweight and obese women presenting with reduced fetal movements compared with women of normal weight [43].

As has been found in other studies, both extremes of parity were shown to be associated with an increased risk of stillbirth [17, 44]. In our study grandmultiparous women had the highest risk and Pacific women were more likely to be grandmultiparous than women of other ethnicities. Advanced maternal age can impact upon the relationship between stillbirth and grandmultiparity, however in this study maternal age was included in the adjusted model and the relationship remained. The mechanisms that might underlay the relationship between high parity and stillbirth risk are not yet understood. A speculation by Aliyu and others is that "uterine exhaustion" is reached and the uterus becomes less effective in its nurturing of the fetus [17]. As previous pregnancy complications were not associated with increased risk of stillbirth in this study it is unlikely that the effect of high parity is mediated by adverse outcomes in previous pregnancies.

We found no association between maternal age and stillbirth; this may be due to the study being underpowered for such an association, as previous large population based studies have found associations between both young [45, 46] and advanced maternal age [47, 48] and stillbirth. Advanced maternal age has also been specifically associated with unexplained stillbirth [49, 50], whereas in this study we included all causes of late stillbirth (after exclusion of fetal abnormalities and multiple pregnancies) which may dilute an association between advanced maternal age and unexplained stillbirth in particular. One other possible explanation for our differing findings may be that in two of the three District Health Boards where this study took place, women over 35 years are routinely offered increased antenatal testing in late pregnancy with a low threshold for early induction at term and beyond [51].

A causal relationship between maternal smoking and poor perinatal outcomes is well established [52]. The association between smoking and late stillbirth was significant in univariable analysis but was not in the multivariable analysis, however the aOR is consistent with findings from other larger studies [18, 31] and the lack of statistical significance in the current study may be due to insufficient power. Previous studies that have explored the relationship between passive smoking and stillbirth have also shown an increased risk for non-smokers exposed to environmental tobacco smoke [53, 54].

This study was powered to detect an odds ratio of 2, with a power of 80% at the 5% level of significance for a risk factor with 20% prevalence, such as obesity or Pacific ethnicity. However it had insufficient power to determine the significance of risk factors with lower prevalence (such as recreational drug use), or that have a smaller strength of association with late stillbirth, such as smoking.

Pacific ethnicity was not found to be an independent risk factor for late stillbirth. The disparity in stillbirth risk experienced by Pacific women can therefore be attributed to other factors such as obesity and high parity. Further research is required to better understand the mechanisms by which factors such as obesity and high parity are associated with late stillbirth.