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Clinical Chemistry 50: 2403-2405, 2004; 10.1373/clinchem.2004.041806
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(Clinical Chemistry. 2004;50:2403-2405.)
© 2004 American Association for Clinical Chemistry, Inc.

Technical Briefs

Circulating Fetal DNA in Maternal Plasma Is Increased in Pregnancies at High Altitude and Is Further Enhanced by Preeclampsia

Xiao Yan Zhong1, Yiming Wang2, Suqin Chen2, Labu3, Pubuzhuoma3, Gesangzhuogab3, Ouzhuwangmu4, Xiaoying Pan5, Ninghu Zhu5, Cornelia Hahn1, Berthold Huppertz6, Wolfgang Holzgreve1 and Sinuhe Hahn1,a

1 University Women’s Hospital/Department of Research, University of Basel, Basel, Switzerland
2 Department of Medical Genetics, Sun Yat-Sen University, Guangzhou, Peoples Republic of China
3 The Second People’s Hospital of Tibet, Lhasa, Tibet, Peoples Republic of China
4 Lhasa Maternal and Child Health Hospital Tibet, Lhasa, Tibet, Peoples Republic of China
5 Department of Gynaecology, Maternal and Children’s Hospital of Guangdong Province, Guangzhou, Peoples Republic of China
6 Department of Anatomy II, University Hospital, RWTH, Aachen, Germany

aaddress correspondence to this author at: Laboratory for Prenatal Medicine, University Women’s Hospital/Department of Research, Spitalstrasse 21, CH 4031 Basel, Switzerland; fax 41-61-325-9399, e-mail shahn@uhbs.ch

The first 20% of the full text of this article appears below.

Pregnancy at high altitude (>2700 m) is characterized by the delivery of smaller than average babies (birth weight may decrease by as much as 100 g per 1000 m increase in altitude), as well as an increased incidence of intrauterine growth restriction and preeclampsia (1)(2)(3). The placenta also exhibits clear morphologic changes, which may represent a compensatory adaptation to facilitate adequate transfer of oxygen to the fetus, in that the terminal villi display increased vascularization and thinning of the syncytiotrophoblast layer (4)(5).

Previous studies have indicated that circulating fetal DNA concentrations in maternal plasma are increased in pregnancies affected by preeclampsia (6)(7), fetal growth restriction (8), or preterm labor (9); pregnancies with aneuploid fetuses (10)(11); and pregnancies affected by other pregnancy-related disorders involving an underlying placental pathology (12)(13). This has led to the suggestion that abnormalities in placentation may be associated with increased liberation of fetal DNA into the maternal circulation (14)(15).

For this reason we investigated whether circulating fetal DNA concentrations are affected in pregnancies at high altitude. Furthermore, because it has also been reported that ethnic groups that have adapted to living at high altitudes for centuries or millennia, e.g., native Tibetans, have better pregnancy outcomes than recent migrants, e.g., Han . . . [Full Text of this Article]






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