Recreational Physical Activity and the Risk of PE

[caryn]

I *think* they used pre-pregnancy weight only. So if you are normal weight and exercise daily, you're at slightly lower risk of PE.

(I was normal weight and exercised daily. So... YMMV.)

And no, you don't sound dumb. I had to go back and check! These studies are so so complicated.

[rosalinda]

Hey Caryn, I know I sound totally dumb...but I'm still not sure I understand...so, if i now weigh 104 lbs, then even if i walk(exercise) daily and my weight goes up during pregnancy as it would normally, then my chances increase? Can you pretty please try to dumb it down even more for me :)

[caryn]

There were a couple of studies suggesting a protective effect from exercise in pregnancy; this study tried to figure out exactly what they meant by "exercise". (Preliminary studies are always kind of vague.) It turns out that normal-weight women who exercise more than 25 times per month (essentially daily, then) had a slightly lower risk of PE, and that as their weight went up, the benefit from exercise disappeared.

[rosalinda]

Hm...can someone please explain this to me, I'm not sure I understand?

[caryn]

The adjusted odds ratio was 0.79 (95% confidence interval: 0.65, 0.96) for preeclampsia when comparing women who exercised 25 times or more per month with inactive women. The association appeared strongest among women whose body mass index was less than 25 kg/m(2) and was absent among women whose body mass index was higher than 30 kg/m(2). These results suggest that the preventive effect of recreational physical activity during pregnancy may be more limited than has been shown in case-control studies and may apply to nonobese women only...

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18701444

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