Annie Murphy Paul: "Origins"
http://thedianerehmshow.org/shows/2010-09-30/annie-murphy-paul-origins
How the nine months before birth can affect the rest of a person's life. Understanding the growing body of research that connects experiences in the womb and lifelong health.
Guests
Annie Murphy Paul
journalist and author of "The Cult of Personality."
Janet DiPietro
associate dean for research and professor in the Department of Population, Family & Reproductive Health at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.
Comments
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As a scientist, health care practitioner, and a woman currently 32 weeks pregnant, I enjoyed her ability to weave personal narrative, philosophical and historical insight into a discussion of leading research on fetal origins. She has a careful and balanced discussion on a variety of controversial topics in a sensitive and balanced manner. Which is perhaps why it is all the more shocking that after journeying with us nearly the whole nine months, Ms. Murphy Paul completely drops the ball when it comes to discussing the scientific literature around timing and method of delivery and how these final hours, days and weeks impact the mother and baby both in the moment and over the course of a lifetime. Don't get me wrong, I did not feel that Ms. Murphy Paul "owed" me an explanation for her own planned C section (though it did seem strange that she did not elaborate on this given how candid she was throughout the rest of the book about her decisions, opinions and feelings) and I am not a natural child birth zealot. But her failure to even discuss the potential risks and harms vs. benefits for the fetus and the mother of a "scheduled medical intervention" vs. allowing labor to begin when the complex hormonal interplay between both fetus and mother determine that the time is right for the baby to be born means that her work is left dramatically unfinished and incomplete. In place of a thoughtful disussion of the potential short term and long term impacts of birth interventions large and small, of which there is a significant and growing body of research, she instead substitutes a weak and sparsely cited discussion of the effect of birth pain on the fetus which ultimately reads as some sort of personal justification on behalf of the author's own birth choices rather than a balanced examination of the issue.
Please ask your guests how a high birth weight can affect a girl's future health. My 10 lb-12 oz baby girl was born naturally and has been in good health since. I do not know if gestational diabetes was in play, but she did have a very large placenta.
What about low birth weight babies? I was born in 1954 @ 3lb. 13 oz.
I already have experienced retinal detachment in my 50's.
Do you address this in you book?
What about women who are given hormones to keep the pregnancy going to full term? How or does this affect the fetus?
Please discuss the great increase in cesarean rates and the effects on these infants. I have had two very unwanted cesareans and I know my children needed a better bonding experience.
Coffee?
What effect does abortion have on the fetus?
As a point of correction: Michael Skinner is a researcher at Washington State University School of Biological Sciences, not University of Washington.
Most members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints do not smoke or drink or use drugs so I wondered if studies have been done utilizing this religious population to see what kind of birth outcomes they have compared to the general population?- Mary Silver, Farmington, Utah
I have Hashimoto's thyroid disease with confirmed thyroperoxidase antibodies, which is a fairly common condition. Since we know there are autoimmune conditions for which the fetus can be affected by maternal antigens, such as with Lupus, is there much known about how "less extreme" conditions and their associated antibodies can affect a developing fetus.
There are a lot of theories on how people grow up to be transgender, some of them nature and some of them nurture. I wonder how much research has been done to see how issues or difficulties in the pregnancy period might have led to this outcome?
You indicated that there was an increase in obesity and diabetes in the children of the starving pregnant mothers imprisoned in WWII.
I assume the new mothers were freed from those terrible confinements after the war. To what extent might the subsequent nutritional habits of the now free mother influence the long term nutrional habits of the child gestated during her confinement? Could a mother's habit of perhaps over feeding the children (a possible response by a once starving mother) lead to obesity in these children and the subsequent health problems associated with the children as obese adults.
As the research in epigenetics grows. specifically as we continue to discover how important early stages of fetal development are on a person's life, will this research alter public opinion about aborting a fetus?
Could you ask your guest, Annie Murphy Paul, if being a forceps baby has any effect on his/her development.
We older folks ate everything, drank wine, did all the no nos when pregnant. Any data on our children now in their 40s & 50s compared to the present generation?
I am a research scientist in Immunology with a PhD in genetics. I must disagree with your expert's comment that epigenetic influences can be transmitted vertically through successive generations. The vast scientific consensus is that this is not the case.
In fact, it was a theory put forward by Jean-Baptiste Lamarck in the early nineteenth century before Darwin's theory was published in 1859. He argued that as a giraffe strained up higher to reach upper branches, that "effort" (an epigenetic effect - btw the field of epigenetics and gene expression is older than the last 15 years! It has been going on for decades!) was somehow transmitted to its offspring. It appears to make sense but is a fundamental misunderstanding. The environment can change gene expression of the individual (the giraffe's effort may have an effect on its neck muscles and gene expression in those muscles), but that gene expression will NOT be transmitted to the next generation genetically. Although of course, the giraffe's effort to obtain food from the upper branches for its offspring will change the gene expression of its offspring (food changes gene expression just like every other environmental factor).
It is confusing to say 'fetal origins' is a new field when it really has been studied ever since Crick and Watson's discovery of DNA's structure in 1953.
Is Ms. Paul familiar with "Primordial sound theory" of Deepak Chopra, I believe.? Is there a correlation with the environmental influence Ms. Paul describes? The theory -- second hand -- is that the earth is emitting a frequency at the moment of birth (of gestation ?) and that an individual will respond to that same frequency when encountered later in life. Ray in North Tx Thanks.
This is interesting! I read about how in pregnancy if a woman has a lot of morning sickness causing her to throw up frequently, her children have a predisposition to salt for the rest of their life. Can you comment on this?
Is it possible that taking DES during most of pregnancy can result in a child with Androgen Insensitivity Disorder?
The brain is particularly plastic early in development. The connections between nerve cells that form during this critical period are quite robust, though they still can be modified later, be it on smaller scale. Hundreds of modified genes have been associated with developmental disorders. Only few are known to influence brain development. Some may run in families. Environmental stimuli influence gene expression. To date we do not understand cause and effect.
Under these circumstances, It makes no sense to blame ourselves, unless grave drug abuse is involved.
Read more here:
brainmindinst.blogspot.com/2008/04/autism-schizophrenia-time.html
By the time I registered and asked my question, the show had ended! Is it possible to have the guest, Annie Murphy Paul, answer my question after the show. I realize the author wrote a book about the nine months before birth, but my question is about the birth itself and if forceps and the mother being anesthetized by ether affects the development of the child?
I have a question. I know that as the egg travels down the fallopian tubes it is guarded by "helper cells" that also seem to be in charge of letting sperm into the egg - or not. Has there been any research on whether or not things that we do might effect what kind of sperm is allowed in? Perhaps a woman can influence her child's gender or other factors in this way? We can influence our physiological states simply through thought/mindfulness - what about which eggs are allowed to be fertilized and by which sperm? Has any research been done on this possibility?
How far in advance of conception should a woman start preparing herself for pregnancy? For example, taking prenatal vitiamins, increasing exercise, etc. What type of affect does pre-conception care have on a fetus?
Indeed, beginning before birth, is critical.
Planning before conception need always be considered. Drs. should advise this with all females who could conceive.
One-half of all preganancies are unplanned. As Dr. Dipetro stated, most harmful effects are in the first half of pregnancy. Alcohol is a terrible teratogen. Binge drinking is on the increase (has quadrupled in young women since the early 1990's).
Thanks to NPR for addressing these needs.
I really appreciated the story, and I applaud both women for this fascinating exploration into the world of the not-yet-born. However, was disturbed by the wanton use of the term "parasite" when referring to the fetus. Parasitologists define parasites as an organism in this way:
1. An ecological relationship between two *different* organisms, one designated the parasite, the other the host.
2. The parasite is physiologically or metabolically dependent upon its host.
3. Heavily infected hosts will be killed by their parasites or harm will be done to the host.
4. The reproductive potential of the parasite exceeds that of their hosts.
5. There is an overdispersed frequency distribution of parasites within the host population. That is, the parasite population is not evenly distributed amongst the host population nor is it randomly distributed but clumped, so some hosts have a lot of parasites, most have very few.
(Crofton, H. D. Parasitology 63, 179–193 )
In addition, fetal microchimerism suggests this may be a more symbiotic, than parasitic, relationship.
The human fetus inside his or her human mother does not meet these characteristics.
Not only is this term scientifically inaccurate, I personally find the term offensive and denigrating.
I take with a spoonful of salt any scientific conclusions drawn by a graduate of the Columbia University School of Journalism.