Association of maternal age and presence of non-communicable diseases in consanguineous marriage with congenital abnormalities in infants

Abstract

Consanguineous marriages are most common among communities where most families are of traditional and extended types. It has been seen that females who conceive at a very young age or have any non-communicable disease have higher chances to have off springs with congenital abnormalities. Objective: To find out the association between maternal age and non-communicable diseases with congenital abnormalities in children. Methods: It is a cross-sectional study performed at District Head Quarter Hospital, Okara, including 100 married participants in the age range of 19-55 years after obtaining their informed consent Results: It was observed that 57% of mothers were below 20 at marriage, 42% were above 20 at marriage and 1% of mothers were above 30 at marriage, were having children with congenital abnormalities. 22 out of 100 mothers had obesity, 15 had diabetes and 21 had CVD when pregnant. The infants born to these mothers suffered from brain anomalies, cleft lip and cleft palate, CVD and diabetes. The results were obtained with p less than 0.05. Conclusion: Congenital abnormalities were more common among children with mothers aged below 20 or 25 and suffering from any metabolic or genetic disorder.