Prevalence of Vascular Disruption anomalies and association with young maternal age: A EUROCAT study to compare the United Kingdom with other European Countries

Gastroschisis is congenital anomaly of the abdominal wall. It is part of a group of the vascular disruption anomalies, which occur when there is a reduction in blood flow to a structure in the fetus. Previous research showed that younger mothers are at a greater risk of having a pregnancy with gastroschisis and that the risk is higher in the UK than other European countries. Within the European Platform on Rare Diseases Registration, the JRC is operating the Central Registry of EUROCAT, a European network for surveillance of congenital anomalies. The EUROCAT database contains over 1 million cases of anomalies reported since 1980 and is an invaluable source of information on these rare conditions. The aim of this study was to analyse the prevalence of other vascular disruption anomalies to determine if both the younger maternal age and the geographical associations also occur in these anomalies. All pregnancies with anomalies classified as due to vascular disruption reported to EUROCAT for birth years 2005 - 2017 from 26 European population-based congenital anomaly registries were analysed. The study found that vascular disruption anomalies that have an increased risk for younger mothers (such as gastroschisis) have a higher prevalence in the UK, while those anomalies with weaker associations with maternal age (such as limb reduction defects) do not have an increased prevalence in the UK, which may indicate a different aetiology for these anomalies.

MORRIS Joan;  WELLESLEY Diana;  LIMB Elisabeth;  BERGMAN Jorieke E.H.;  KINSNER-OVASKAINEN Agnieszka;  ADDOR Marie-Claude;  BROUGHAM Jennifer;  CAVERO-CARBONELL Clara;  DIAS Carlos Matias;  ECHEVARRÍA-GONZÁLEZ-DE-GARIBAY Luis;  GATT Miriam;  HAEUSLER Martin;  BARISIC Ingeborg;  KLUNGSOYR Kari;  LELONG Natalie;  MATERNA-KIRYLUK Anna;  NEVILLE Amanda;  NELEN Vera;  O’MAHONY Mary;  PERTHUS Isabelle;  PIERINI Anna;  RANKIN Judith;  RISSMANN Anke;  ROUGET Florence;  SAYERS Gerardine;  STEVENS Sara;  TUCKER David;  GARNE Ester; 

2023-01-03

WILEY

JRC128467

2472-1727 (online),   

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/bdr2.2122,    https://publications.jrc.ec.europa.eu/repository/handle/JRC128467,   

10.1002/bdr2.2122 (online),