الفهرس Only 14 pages are availabe for public view
 |  | from | 101 |  |  |
| | | from | 101 | | |
Abstract
Preterm delivery is defined as birth occurring before 37 completed weeks of gestation. It complicates 12-13% of all births in the United States. (1)
Because of the variability in the definition of preterm it is difficult to asses its incidence allover the world. (2)
Preterm delivery is not only a leading cause of neonatal morbidity and mortality, (2) but also its long term sequelae pose some problems for the offspring and for the mother, (4-7) It is unclear whether elevated circulating levels of triglycerides or cholestrol can increase the risk of preterm delivery or not, (44) that plasma triglyceride levels increase during late pregnancy and enhanced lipolytic activity leading to increase level of FFAs in serum of pregnant women and consequently of fetus across the placenta.(51)
So, the aim of our work was to demonstrate the influence of elevated maternal FFAs during third trimester on the risk of preterm delivery, which had not been extensively examined in epidemiological studies.
Also, in our study we demonstrated the effect of elevated level of maternal plasma FFAs on mode of delivery, birth weight and admission of infants to NICU.
This study included 40 women aged between (20-30) years, 20 of them had preterm delivery and others in term delivery.
Venous blood samples had been withdrawn from each subject during third trimester at morning after a period of fasting between 10-12 h, the concentration of FFAs in serum was measured by an enzymatic method.
Also, pregnancy outcome and complications were obtained by using postnatal delivery records to evaluate mode of delivery, infant body weight and infant admission to NICU.