Organ weights and length anthropometry measures at autopsy for sudden infant death syndrome cases and other infant deaths in the Chicago infant mortality study
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 19458397 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Josyf C Mychaleckyj (0000-0003-2595-0005, Department of Public Health Sciences, School of Medicine University of Virginia Charlottesville Virginia USA, corresponding author), Cornelius Normeshie (Department of Family Medicine, School of Medicine University of Virginia Charlottesville Virginia USA), Cornelius A Normeshie (0009-0002-8003-9505, University of Virginia), Keith L Keene (0000-0002-7826-399X, Department of Public Health Sciences, School of Medicine University of Virginia Charlottesville Virginia USA), Fern R Hauck (0000-0001-7309-7665, Department of Family Medicine, School of Medicine University of Virginia Charlottesville Virginia USA) |
| Year | 2024 |
| Volume | 36 |
| Issue | 10 |
| Pages | e24126-e24126 |
| Publication date | 2024-10-01 |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | American Journal of Human Biology (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1042-0533 • E-ISSN: 1520-6300 |
| Publisher | Wiley (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1002/ajhb.24126 |
| PMID | 38957054 |
| OpenAlex | W4400300069 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 44 |
Organ weights are a possible diagnostic or pathophysiological clue to distinguishing sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS) cases from other infant deaths but suffer from major confounding. Using autopsy data from the Chicago Infant Mortality Study, a majority African‐American case–control study of deceased infants under 1 year conducted 1993–96, we assessed differences in the weights of brain, thymus, kidneys, lungs, liver, spleen, total body, and four length anthropometry measures in SIDS‐diagnosed infants compared to controls. Using exact and coarsened matching, we ran Bayesian linear models with these anthropometry outcomes and repeated the analyses substituting the corresponding fitted allometrically‐scaled organ weight indices to account for body size. After detailed analysis and adjustment for potential confounders, we found that matched SIDS infants were generally bigger than controls, with higher mean brain, liver, spleen, thymus, lung, and total body weights, and higher mean head and chest circumference, crown‐heel, crown‐rump lengths. SIDS infants also had higher mean thymus, liver, spleen, lung and total body weight indices. The association with thymus weight was proportionately greater in magnitude than any other outcome measure and independent of body size. The results of these more detailed analyses are consistent with recent findings from other studies with differing racial compositions, and substantially confirm the primary organ sites for more detailed mechanistic research into the biological dysregulation contributing to underlying pathophysiology of SIDS
Anthropometry · Autopsy · Environmental health · Infant mortality · Population · Sudden infant death syndrome · Demography · Human-Animal Interaction Studies · Medicine · Neuroscience of respiration and sleep · Restraint-Related Deaths · Internal Medicine · Pediatrics
| Highly cited | No |
|---|