Glucose Dysmetabolism and Placental Dysfunction
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Prospective Research of Glucose Dysmetabolism to Enhance Knowledge and Treatments to end preventable harm
IRAS ID
330459
Contact name
Dimitrios Siassakos
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
University College London
Clinicaltrials.gov Identifier
161623, EDGE Number
Duration of Study in the UK
1 years, 8 months, 1 days
Research summary
Gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM) indicates abnormal responses of one of the sugar hormones 'insulin' and other related hormones (which are sensing molecules in the body) and leads to increases in blood sugar levels in pregnant women. It is thoughts that impairment of maternal sugar hormones may affect how the growing baby gets the necessary nutrients and energy from the placenta which is the unit that supplies the baby with these things during pregnancy. High or low blood glucose levels in a pregnant woman (studied through the levels in her blood) can change the womb environment, interfering with the placenta and baby's development. Gestational diabetes is associated with many complicatoins, the most severe being stillbirth (death of the baby in the womb) and is worse if not rapidly detected or acted on in pregnancy.
This study is designed to study insulin and other sugar hormones in detail and relate it to different form of glucose abnormalities that are recorded in pregnant women. In particular we wishto study groups of women wilth milder sugar abnormalities, some of which are not currently recognised in the NHS as being a form of gestational diabetes such as reactive hypoglycaemia. We will compare the outcomes (births, sizes of babies and other outcomes) of these pregnancies to better establish if some of these forms of glucose abnormalities also have the same pregnancy complications.Furthermore, we will look closely at the placenta and how sugar may lead to changes within it that might explaoin some of the pregnancy complications seen in association with diabetes including stillbirth. We will study both how the placenta structure is affected and also how blood glucose transfers from the mother to the baby and influences values seen in the baby's cord blood, including sugar and other molecules and markers that make the cord blood sticky.
REC name
South Central - Oxford C Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
24/SC/0176
Date of REC Opinion
13 Jun 2024
REC opinion
Further Information Favourable Opinion