Study Ties Cerebral Palsy To Inflammation And Blood-Clotting Abn...( o develop CP. For years many cases of...),Health

The new findings support those of a study by Drs. Nelson and Grether last year (2) which showed that babies of normal birthweight who were exposed to infection in the womb had nine times the normal risk of developing CP. Other recent studies have linked prenatal infection to premature birth, which increases the risk of CP. However, the lengthy time needed to confirm a diagnosis of CP has made it very difficult to identify what causes the disorder.

"By the time the child is diagnosed, months or years after birth, the trail is already cold," says Dr. Nelson.

In the new study, the researchers measured concentrations of more than 50 substances in dried blood samples from 31 children who had developed CP and 65 who had not. Most of the children with CP whose blood samples were examined were born full-term and were selected from cases in which there was no clear explanation for the disorder. The blood samples were provided by the Newborn Screening Program of the California Genetic Disease Branch, which archives blood that is taken from all newborns in California shortly after birth to screen for metabolic disorders.

Using advanced immunochemistry techniques developed by Dr. Phillips, scientists measured the concentrations of many different substances in tiny amounts of archived blood. They found that every child later diagnosed with CP had higher concentrations of five cytokines, tumor necrosis factor alpha, RANTES, and interleukins 1, 8, and 9, than any of the children who did not develop CP. Most children who later developed CP also had substantial elevations of several other cytokines and of one or more coagulation factors.

The concentrations of these cytokines and coagulation factors were not related to the babies' gestational ages at birth, their birth
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Contact: Natalie Larsen
(301) 496-5751
NIH/National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke
1-Oct-1998