Caesárea Increases the risk of type 1 diabetes
An international review of 10,000 cases reveals that there is
Children born by caesarean section have 20% more possibilities to develop type 1 diabetes than those who come to the world through vaginal delivery, according to a review of the accumulated scientific evidence in observational studies published so far.
Childbirth with surgery prevents baby contact with vaginal flora
The work responsible for the work, led by scientists from Queen's University of Belfast, has analyzed 20 studies that include around 10,000 children with type 1 diabetes and a control group composed of more than one million minors.The conclusion is clear: to be born by caesarean section increases the risk of developing diabetes by 20%.In their work, researchers have ruled out the influence of other possible risk factors such as birth weight, mother's age, birth order, gestational diabetes and breast milk.
The meta -analysis, whose details can be consulted in the May edition of the Diabetology magazine, is part of the investigations aimed at knowing the cause of the considerable expansion of type 1 diabetes in recent years;An expansion that, according to the authors of the study, has evolved in parallel with the recent explosion of births by caesarean section.Both phenomena have been especially intense in Western countries.
In Spain the figures give to think.In the last decade the cases of type 1 diabetes have increased between 15% and 30%, as in most Western countries, especially in children under five years.Meanwhile, if in 1998 caesarean sections represented 18.2% of the total, today this figure has shot up to 25.2%, far from 15% that the World Health Organization considers acceptable.
"Type 1 diabetes occurs when the immune system destroys the insulin producing cells of the pancreas. A hypothesis suggests that being born by caesarean section can affect the development of the immune system because babies are previously exposed to the bacteria of the environment in the hospital thatMaternal bacteria, "explains Chris Patterson, director of the study.
Ignacio Conget, of the Endocrinology and Diabetes Service of the Clinical Hospital of Barcelona, believes that the authors' hypothesis is plausible."There is excess hygiene theory, in which the idea that the lack of exposure to pathogens is considered, as is currently the case in Western countries, embobates the immune system and makes it more vulnerable to its own antigens. Birth by caesarean section isThe most hygienic or sterile form of birth.The authors of meta -analysis believe that this difference in the composition of the baby's bacterial flora could increase the risk of type 1 diabetes.
In Spain around 10 new cases of type 1 diabetes are diagnosed per 100,000 inhabitants a year, most of them between the 10 and 12 years of age.In fact, more than 50% of new cases are diagnosed in pediatric age.20% more risk over 4,500 new annual cases in Spain is a figure too important to not consider the meta -analysis carried out by investigators from 10 European countries.Among other things because the number of caesarean sections does not stop growing.Motherhood delay has increased complications, but this factor does not explain that 25% of deliveries end in caesarean section.
Ignacio Conget acknowledges that the study ofKnow the biological mechanism that could explain the relationship between caesarean section and diabetes.Until that point is clarified, experts believe that it makes no sense to avoid caesarean section simply to avoid the increased risk of diabetes to the newborn.A different issue is that cesarean births must be limited to cases where this intervention is strictly necessary from the medical point of view.
Different studies in Western countries indicate that in an important part of the births that end in caesarean section are not strictly necessary and are made for reasons of organization or comfort.
