How does women's preconception health status affect health of the next generation? (2014)

Undergraduate: Chenxi Yu

Faculty Advisor: Donna Gilleskie
Department: Mathematical Decision Science

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This study investigates the relationship between women¿s preconception health status and the health of the next generation. 49% of all pregnancies in the United States are unintended which presents a significant public health challenge as women often do not start necessary healthy practices until they find out about their pregnancies. Women¿s health status during the preconception period is essential because the greatest effect of several risk factors that affect fetal development often occurs before women gain awareness of their pregnancies. In this study, pregnancy outcome variables include the way pregnancies ended, gestation, and birth weights of babies and women¿s preconception health status is measured using general health status variables, Body Mass Index, and smoking regularity. The effect of women¿s preconception health status on pregnancy outcomes is investigated by jointly estimating several equations simultaneously. This study uses data from all four waves of the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health. Specifically, instead of using the responses at each wave, information in the survey was used to identify the timings of all births independent of the survey year. An annual data set is constructed with information on mothers¿ health multiple years prior to pregnancy. Although final results are pending further estimations, this new way of utilizing the data set allows a yearly hazard model of pregnancy.