medwireNews: The future risk for developing type 2 diabetes in women with gestational diabetes (GDM) is particularly high in those who deliver a large for gestational age (LGA) baby, say researchers.
During follow-up averaging between 5.3 and 8.5 years, the rates of type 2 diabetes among women with GDM were 4.5% for the 376 women who had a normal-weight infant and 11.8% for the 68 who delivered an LGA infant. By contrast, just one of the 334 women who did not have GDM developed type 2 diabetes, and this woman had a normal-weight infant.
“Thus, an LGA delivery in non-GDM women is likely to be related to other factors than maternal dysglycemia,” write Heidi Hakkarainen (Kuopio University Hospital, Finland) and co-researchers in Primary Care Diabetes.
Indeed, at the time of follow-up, there were no appreciable differences in glycemic profiles between women without GDM according to whether they had delivered a normal-weight or LGA baby. By contrast, women who had GDM and an LGA infant had notably worse profiles than those who delivered a normal-weight baby.
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