Anthropometry in antipsychotic-naïve first-episode psychosis patients: An exploratory approach to the role of environmental early life events in two independent samples.
BACKGROUND: Patients with schizophrenia exhibit a reduced life expectancy mainly due to medical-related pathologies which might have been initiated due to stressful events during fetal development. Indeed, intra-uterus growth patterns predict anthropometric measures in adulthood, describing risk factors for schizophrenia and metabolic disorders. We aim to evaluate anthropometric values in two cohorts of antipsychotic-naïve first-episode episode psychosis (FEP) and correlated them with surrogate markers of the fetal environment such as birth weight (BW) and season of birth. METHODS: BW, season of birth, and anthropometric values from 2 cohorts of FEP patients (Barcelona and Santander) were evaluated. In cohort B, 91 patients, and 110 controls while in cohort S, 644 and 235 were included respectively. RESULTS: Patients were shorter, slimmer, and with lower BMI compared with controls. In both cohorts, patients, and female patients born in winter displayed the shortest height. Regarding BW, height was significantly associated with the interaction of diagnosis and BW in the whole sample and the male subsample. CONCLUSIONS: Our results confirm reduced anthropometric features in FEP at onset while suggesting the influence of winter birth and BW, highlighting the role of early life events in the later outcome of FEP with sex differences.Funding for this study was provided by grant RO1 DK069265 - National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (Dr. Kirkpatrick), PI14/00753 and PI20/00661 (Dr. Garcia-Rizo) PI08/0208; PI11/00325 and PI14/00612 (Dr.Bernardo), funded by the Carlos III Health Institute (ISCIII) and co-financed by the European Union, Centro de Investigación Biomédica en Red de salud Mental, CIBERSAM, ERCA Program / Generalitat de Catalunya And Secretaria d’Universitats i Recerca del Departament d’Economia I Coneixement (2017SGR1355). Departament de Salut de la Generalitat de Catalunya, en la convocatoria corresponent a l’any 2017 de concessió de subvencions del Pla Estratègic de Recerca i Innovació en Salut (PERIS) 2016-2020, SLT006/17/00345. This work and the research tasks carried out in the Santander cohort (PAFIP) were supported by the Instituto de Salud Carlos III and co-financed by the European Union (PI020499, PI050427 and PI060507; Prof. Crespo-Facorro) and the Valdecilla Institute of Biomedical Research (grant no. INT/A20/04 and INT/A21/10; Dr. Vázquez-Bourgon). Dr. Fernandez-Egea is supported by the 2022 MRC/NIHR CARP award (MR/W029987/1) and this research was supported by the NIHR Cambridge Biomedical Research Centre (BRC-1215-20014). The views expressed are those of the author(s) and not necessarily of the NIHR or the Department of Health and Social Care
