Factors associated with "low" and "high" birth weight
Ganguly, M.; Elwood, J.H.; MacKenzie, G.
American Journal of Epidemiology 96(2): 161-167
1972
ISSN/ISBN: 0002-9262 PMID: 5048981 Document Number: 521542
During 1968 all of 1211 single live infants born to Belfast residents at a city hospital were studied. They were grouped according to whether birthweight was low, under 2500 g, normal, between 2501 and 3849 g, or high, over 3850 g. In the groups there were 147, 898 and 166 infants, respectively. Of the infants with normal birthweight a random sample of 194 was taken and of those studied 16 were omitted leaving 491 infants for study. Low birthweights were associated with pregnancy significantly shorter than that with normal birthweights and high birthweights with pregnancy significantly longer than that with normal. Significantly more infants of Roman Catholic mothers were of high or low birthweight than infants of non-Roman Catholic mothers. None of the other factors studied showed significant differences between infants of both high and low birthweights and infants of normal birthweight.