Lifecourse Medicine and Birth Cohort Research Group

We assess the lifelong and next-generation outcomes of children and adults born preterm or small for gestational age on a population level in Finnish and Nordic Register-birth cohorts. These cohorts link data from medical birth registers, other social and healthcare registers and data from statistical authorities.

The cornerstone of register studies is our NORDCAP collaboration with Norwegian University of Science and Technology NTNU, Karolinska Institutet and University of Copenhagen, which enables studies in Nordic birth cohorts of over 13 million individuals. The Finnish part of NORDCAP is based on the Finnish 1987-1990 Birth Cohort.

In an EU-funded project IMPROVE PRETERM we focus on causal inference methodologies in observational data to compare the outcomes of prenatal and neonatal treatments related to preterm birth.

The Helsinki Study of Very Low Birth Weight Adults HeSVA includes adults born preterm at very low birth weight (VLBW; <1500 g) and a comparison group of adults born at term. HeSVA members were born between 1978 and 1985, when intensive care of small preterm infants was being started, making HeSVA is one of the oldest cohorts of its kind. HeSVA members have participated in a detailed health examination at mean age 22 years and again at mean age 38 years, together with a corresponding Norwegian cohort (Low Birth Weight Life - Department of Clinical and Molecular Medicine - NTNU).

ESTER Study comprises 1161 persons born in Northern Finland 1985 to 1989. The main aim is to assess whether the findings in VLBW adults extend to the large group of adults who were born moderately or late preterm, and whether similar outcomes are seen in adults whose mothers had gestational diabetes or hypertension in pregnancy. About half of the ESTER participants are also members of the Northern Finland Birth Cohort 1986.

Adults Born Preterm Sibling Study comprises 79 sibling pairs, one of whom is born preterm VLBW between 1978 and 1990, and another is born at term. In 2014-2017, the cohort underwent a detailed assessment including MRI imaging and spectroscopy, exercise physiology and fat and muscle tissue sampling. By comparing sibling pairs we are able to account for unmeasured confounding factors.

We work with clinically assessed population birth cohorts such as the Northern Finland Birth Cohorts and Helsinki Birth Cohort Study and corresponding studies such as Finnish Gestational Diabetes Study FinnGeDi .

80% of small vulnerable newborns are born in low and middle income countries. We have established collaboration with Kamuzu University of Health Sciences in Malawi and University of Tampere, International Society for Diarrhoeal Disease Research in Bangladesh and Uppsala University. We participate in follow-up of three birth cohorts, in Malawi (iLiNS-DYAD-M and LAIS) and Bangladesh (MINIMat), originally based on randomized trials in pregnancy. Uniquely in a low-resource setting, duration of pregnancy was then assessed by ultrasound. Two of these cohorts, one in Malawi and another in Bangladesh, are now reaching their twenties, and we are assessing the reproductive and next-generation health in people born as small vulnerable newborns.