Reduced fetal growth rate and increased risk of death from ischaemic heart disease: cohort study of 15 000 Swedish men and women born 1915-29

Abstract

This study provides by far the most persuasive evidence of a real association between size at birth and mortality from ischaemic heart disease in men, which cannot be explained by methodological artefact or socioeconomic confounding. It strongly suggests that it is variation in fetal growth rate rather than size at birth that is aetiologically important.