Impact of pregnant women with advanced age on fetal disease

Objective To explore the impact of pregnant women with advanced age on fetal disease. Methods A clinical data of 28 897 singleton pregnancies who delivered from January 2009 to December 2014 in The Third Affiliated Hospital of Guangzhou Medical University were retrospectively analyzed. According to the maternal age, all cases were divided into ≥35 years group (n=3 670), and 18-34 years group (n=25 227). The fetal disease rates of two the groups were analyzed by Chi-square test and U test. Results The percentage of singleton pregnancies at the age of 35 years and older was 12.70%, and the percentage of patients between 18 and 34 was 87.30%. The rate of total fetal diseases in ≥35 years group was higher than that in 18-34 years group (2.62% and 2.04%, χ2=5.106, P=0.024). And the rates of fetal death, fetal chromosome abnormality and fetal multiple malformations in ≥35 years group (1.66%, 0.57% and 1.36‰, respectively) were higher than those in 18-34 years group (1.41%, 0.12% and 0.44‰), P values less than 0.05. Conclusion The rates of fetal death, fetal chromosome abnormality and fetal multiple malformations increase in pregnancies with advanced age. Key words: Maternal age; Fetal diseases; Fetal death; Chromosome aberrations; Congenital abnormalities