Cafe Sci: Take good care of your past because it will determine your future
Monday, May 21, 2012 ' 8:00 PM
Selected By: Melanie Heeley
24 Broad Street
NG1 3AN
Nottingham (map)
52.954639 -1.144414
We are in the basement
Selected By: Melanie Heeley
Dr Ines Varela-Silva
Loughborough University
(School of Sport, Exercise and Health Sciences - Centre for Global Health and Human Development)
The Developmental Origins of Health and Disease hypothesis (DOHaD) points to the idea that the incidence of certain adult diseases (for example, type-2 diabetes, stroke, and heart disease) are linked to development before birth. The work of David Barker and colleagues at Southampton University in the 1980's and 1990's,for example, shows an association between low-birth-weight and cardiovascular disease in adulthood. A great deal of research also shows that intergenerational effects play a role in the health of the current generations. This means that the health of the mothers and grandmothers while they were growing-up, impacts the health of their children and grandchildren, even when environmental conditions change.
In this session I will present results from our research with the Maya in the Yucatan, Mexico and with Maya migrants to the USA in order to emphasise the importance of the prenatal months and the first years of postnatal life as fundamental factors to guarantee a healthy adulthood.
The message I wish to pass-on is that we should raise our children thinking of the health of our grandchildren and great-grandchildren.
Pre-Meetup Conversation
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This is an extremely thought provoking and important hypothesis and would seem to explain patterns in families, along the lines of 'the sins of the fathers (and mothers) are visited on the children' metaphorically speaking of course.
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