Researchers at The University of Nottingham have been awarded more than £95,000 for a study that could lead to new drugs to prevent babies from being born prematurely.
Dr Raheela Khan, of the University’s Academic Division of Obstetrics and Gynaecology based at the newly-opened University of Nottingham Medical School at Derby, is working with colleagues Dr Balwir Matharoo-Ball and Dr Dave Barratt in the University’s School of Pharmacy on the research looking at what makes some women go into labour before their baby is due.
Pre-term labour — babies who are born before 37 weeks — accounts for between six and 10 per cent of all pregnancies. Babies born very prematurely, before 32 weeks, have an increased risk of medical and developmental problems — including disabilities, learning difficulties, eye defects and respiratory disease.
Neonatal intensive care for each premature baby born in the UK costs the NHS thousands of pounds every day and in April 2003 the Government announced that it was to provide £70 million over three years to allow for the purchase of 75 new cots and other specialist equipment.
Currently, drugs that are used to stop contractions in women who go into labour early are ineffective and can cause moderate to severe side effects and, in a very small number of cases, may even result in maternal death.
The Nottingham researchers are looking at ways of using the body’s natural processes that control contractions during labour to design more effective drugs in the future.
Dr Khan said: "The saying goes that the mother is the ideal incubator and, if their body is healthy until the due date, then it’s where the baby should stay. However, once labour starts too early then it is extremely difficult to stop.