News Archive

Pregnant women are advised not to drink alcohol, eat soft cheese or use powerful cleaning products.But little is known about other external factors that can affect the unborn baby.

Dr Kimberley McAuley at the School of Population Health and Dr Monique Robinson at the Telethon Institute for Child Health Research are recruiting 6,000 women in the first trimester of pregnancy to help them understand the impact of exposure to the environment.

"The environment has changed so much since the days of the Raine Study," Dr McAuley said. The babies who were recruited for that study are turning 22 this year.

"We want to know about the types of water pregnant women drink, shower and swim in; their daily activities, nutrition, physical health and overall wellbeing.

"But internal factors can also affect the unborn baby, such as stress.  There is more pressure on women to stay at work longer during pregnancy and we wonder if the stress of the workplace has an impact," she said.

Dr McAuley said she hoped the study, funded by NHMRC, would reveal positive effects on babies from their mothers' lifestyles and choices, not just result in a list of things to avoid.

The information collected from two questionnaires will later be linked to data collected by the Department of Health.

"Connecting the health information enables us to explore the relationships between environmental and psychological events and birth outcomes," she said.

The researchers are looking for women in their first 15 weeks of pregnancy, who are over the age of 18 and who live in the greater Perth metropolitan area , Bunbury or Busselton.

If you know somebody who could participate, urge them to contact Dr McAuley on 6488 2987 or at [email protected]