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Even Low-level prenatal alcohol exposure affects brain structure of babies: Study

Rajeev Choudhury

Even low-level exposure to alcohol during pregnancy has been linked with structural changes in the brain resulting in worse externalising behaviour scores compared to those who had not been exposed, researchers in a new study said.

In the study published in the journal JAMA Open Network recently, researchers from Alberta Children’s Hospital Research Institute compared 135 children with low levels of prenatal alcohol exposure (PAE) and 135 unexposed controls using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and observed disrupted brain structure and function after PAE  even at one drink per week during pregnancy.

The researchers of the study had ensured that neither of the study group had prenatal exposure to other adverse substances like tobacco, cannabis, and illicit drugs.

Children with PAE had lower mean fractional anisotropy (FA), (which describes the degree of anisotropy of a diffusion process in the brain tissues) in the white matter of the left postcentral, left inferior parietal, left planum temporale, left inferior occipital, and right middle areas compared with controls, and higher FA in the gray matter of the putamen, the researchers reported.

The FA value indicated the degree of the structural integrity of the gray matter tissues of the brain, which in turn can be an indicator of risk factors of developing mental illness during later years.

The researchers further found that children with a history of PAE exhibited worse externalizing behaviour scores than controls (mean [SD], 45.2 [9.0] vs 42.8 [9.0]; mean difference, 2.39 [95% CI, 0.30-4.47]) and lower fractional anisotropy in several white matter areas of the brain compared with children in the control group.

Noting that the study had some limitation due to retrospective self-reports of PAE, which was used to determine the PAE status during the study, can be biased and sometimes underreport alcohol consumption, the researchers said that they limited their analysis to participants whose biological mothers reported drinking after awareness of pregnancy and compared them with participants whose biological mothers reported no alcohol consumption before or after pregnancy awareness.

These findings suggest that even small amounts of PAE are associated with structural brain alterations, the researchers concluded.


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