Exposure to high and low temperatures during pregnancy may result in reduced fetal growth (IMAGE)
Caption
An Israeli nation-wide study of more than 600,000 births, led by a researcher at Bar-Ilan University's Azrieli Faculty of Medicine, reveals consistent links between high and low temperatures and low fetal birth weight, particularly exposure to heat during the second and third trimesters. Published in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives, the study evaluates critical windows of susceptibility to extreme low and high temperatures during pregnancy and fetal growth in a nationwide cohort of 624,940 singleton term births in Israel during the period 2010-2014. Image: The three main climatic zones of Israel based on the Köppen classification, one of the most widely used climate classification systems. On the left: 1) Mediterranean (characterized by a dry, hot summer), and semi-arid and desert/arid, both characterized by dry climate and hot temperatures. On the right: 49 natural regions classified by the Israeli Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS) in terms of physical structure, climatic zone and land use, and in terms of the demographic, economic and cultural characteristics of the population
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Dr. Keren Agay-Shay, Bar-Ilan University
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