It's curious. Almost a year ago we reported a study that assured that babies born after term, that is, after the 42nd week of pregnancy, are at greater risk of developing epilepsy during the first year of life.
Now, another study conducted at the University of Aarhus, in Denmark investigates the relationship of this neurological disease with premature babies and those born with low weight.
According to these two investigations, the time that the baby spends inside the uterus, either before or after term, could be decisive for the appearance of childhood epilepsy.
The latest study showed that babies born between the 22nd and 32nd week have a risk of developing epilepsy five times higher than in full-term children, between 39 and 41 weeks of gestation.
Likewise, babies weighing less than 2 kilos at birth also had a five-fold higher rate of disease than those babies weighing between 3 and 3.9 kilos at birth.
In both conclusions, the risk was especially noticeable in children under five years of age, decreasing as children grew.
According to experts, the explanation would be that “the immature brain would be more susceptible than the mature brain to seizures when exposed to risk factors during prenatal life.” However, this explanation would not apply to the risk of epilepsy in babies born post-term
We will be pending new studies that shed light on the possible causes of this chronic disease that affects 1 in 150 people and that in most cases begins in childhood.
