ArticleBMC medicine2018
The growth of assisted reproductive treatment-conceived children from birth to 5 years: a national cohort study.
Article in BMC medicine, 2018. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 34 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
34 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 79 citations in OpenAlex.
- Do IVF culture conditions have an impact on neonatal outcomes? A systematic review and meta-analysis.Journal of assisted reproduction and genetics · 2024Pooled it
- Association of Assisted Reproductive Technology With Offspring Growth and Adiposity From Infancy to Early Adulthood.JAMA network open · 2022Pooled it
- Heterogeneous offspring growth in spontaneous versus in vitro fertilization pregnancies: a retrospective cohort study.Journal of assisted reproduction and genetics · 2026Article
- Identification of novel differentiation trajectories and gene network associations with ectopic pregnancy in fallopian tube epithelium.Human reproduction (Oxford, England) · 2025Article
- Factors influencing the birth weight of ART-conceived offspring.Journal of assisted reproduction and genetics · 2025Review
- A comparative study on infant growth between assisted reproductive technology pregnancy and natural pregnancy.Acta obstetricia et gynecologica Scandinavica · 2025Article
- NADCommunications biology · 2025Article
- Bias due to non-consent in assisted reproductive treatment cohort studies: consent for disclosure to non-contact research in the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority register.Human reproduction (Oxford, England) · 2025Article
- Children born to subfertile couples, how are they doing? Evidence from research.Archives of disease in childhood · 2024Review
- Perinatal health in a cohort of children conceived after assisted reproduction in the UK: a population-based record-linkage study.BMJ open · 2024Article
- Growth of singletons born after frozen embryo transfer until early adulthood: a Finnish register study.Human reproduction (Oxford, England) · 2024Article
- The risk of asthma in singletons conceived by ART: a retrospective cohort study.Human reproduction open · 2024Article
- Overweight or obesity in children born after assisted reproductive technologies in Denmark: A population-based cohort study.PLoS medicine · 2023Article
- A systematic review of transcriptomic studies of the human endometrium reveals inconsistently reported differentially expressed genes.Reproduction & fertility · 2023Article
- Birth size after embryo cryopreservation: larger by all measures?Human reproduction (Oxford, England) · 2023Article
- The X-factor in ART: does the use of assisted reproductive technologies influence DNA methylation on the X chromosome?Human genomics · 2023Article
- Growth of twins conceived using assisted reproductive treatments up to 5 years old: a national growth cohort.Human reproduction (Oxford, England) · 2023Article
- Perinatal and pediatric outcomes associated with the use of fertility treatment: a population-based retrospective cohort study in Ontario, Canada.BMC pregnancy and childbirth · 2023Article
- [Diabetes mellitus: definition, classification, diagnosis, screening and prevention (Update 2023)].Wiener klinische Wochenschrift · 2023Article
- At age 9, the methylome of assisted reproductive technology children that underwent embryo culture in different media is not significantly different on a genome-wide scale.Human reproduction (Oxford, England) · 2022Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
6 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
backgroundBirth weight and early child growth are important predictors of long-term cardiometabolic disease risk, in line with the Developmental Origins of Health and Disease hypothesis. As human assisted reproductive technologies (ARTs) occur during the sensitive periconceptional window of development, it has recently become a matter of urgency to investigate risk in ART-conceived children.
methodsWe have conducted the first large-scale, national cohort study of early growth in ART children from birth to school age, linking the register of ART, held by the UK's Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority, to Scottish maternity and child health databases.
resultsIn this study of 5200 ART and 20,800 naturally conceived (NC) control children, linear regression analysis revealed the birthweight of babies born from fresh embryo transfer cycles is 93.7 g [95% CI (76.6, 110.6)g] less than NC controls, whereas babies born from frozen embryo transfer (FET) cycles are 57.5 g [95% CI (30.7, 86.5)g] heavier. Fresh ART babies grew faster from birth (by 7.2 g/week) but remained lighter (by 171 g), at 6-8 weeks, than NC babies and 133 g smaller than FET babies; FET and NC babies were similar. Length and occipital-frontal circumference followed the same pattern. By school entry (4-7 years), weight, length and BMI in boys and girls conceived by fresh ART and FET were similar to those in NC children.
conclusionsART babies born from fresh embryo transfer grow more slowly in utero and in the first few weeks of life, but then show postnatal catch up growth by school age, compared to NC and FET babies. As low birth weight and postnatal catch-up are independent risk factors for cardiometabolic disease over the life-course, we suggest that further studies in this area are now warranted.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the Socratic graph.