Preterm birth and the risk of chronic disease multimorbidity in adolescence and early adulthood: A population-based cohort study.

ABSTRACT:

Background

People who were born prematurely have high risks of many individual diseases and conditions in the early part of the life course. However, our knowledge of the burden of multiple diseases (multimorbidity) among prematurely born individuals is limited. We aimed to investigate the risk and patterns of chronic disease multimorbidity in adolescence and early adulthood among individuals born across the spectrum of gestational ages, comparing preterm and full-term born individuals.

Methods and findings

We used individual-level data from linked nationwide registers to examine the associations of gestational age at birth with specialised healthcare records of ≥2 chronic diseases (multimorbidity) in adolescence (age 10-17 years) and early adulthood (age 18-30 years). Our s

SUBMITTER: Heikkila K 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8719774 | biostudies-literature | 2021

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature