There is an accumulating body of evidence suggesting that pregnancy is a whole-body stress test, identifying women who have an existing increased propensity for cardiovascular disease, common mental health conditions, and autoimmune disease. However, the vast majority of pregnancy cohorts, much like ALSPAC, recruit women who are already pregnant and therefore have limited pre-pregnancy data.
As many of the ALSPAC index participants are now becoming parents, there is a unique opportunity to chart lifelong trajectories of cardiometabolic and mental health, using prospectively collected data. This can identify if and when differences in these emerge to inform screening and interventions that may prevent complications during and immediately after pregnancy such as preeclampsia and post-natal depression.