Maternal stress at work and in private life during pregnancy and childhood asthma in the offspring: a study protocol

<div><div><div>The objective of the present project is to explore the association between maternal stress, including stress both at work and in private life using independent measures of exposure, and measurements of asthma in their children. Further, we will investigate whether sex of the offspring modifies the association. </div></div><div><div><br></div></div><div><div>The quality of earlier studies varies considerably. One of the most important methodological problems is the quality of exposure assessment including the fact that existing studies often only assess the effects of either stress at work or stress in private life and therefore fail to account for the multiple stressors that are typically faced in life. The proposed project provides unique opportunities to meet the challenges of the existing studies by addressing the hypotheses in a large population-based cohort, assessing maternal stress during pregnancy both at work and in private life with independent information about both exposures and outcome. </div></div><div><div><br></div></div><div><div>The present study protocol therefore gives a detailed description of the data material, inclusion criteria, statistical models, hypotheses and test criteria for a study of maternal stress at work and in private life during pregnancy and childhood asthma in the offspring.</div></div><div><div> </div></div><div><div><br>In accordance with recognised rules of good scientific and statistical practice; the protocol is public available before the exposure data of the study are linked to the outcome data.</div></div></div