Chloe Merritt
Pronouns:
Research Mentor(s): Beverly Strassmann
Research Mentor School/College/Department: Anthropology & RCGD (ISR) / LSA
Program:
Authors: Chloe Merritt, Beverly Strassmann
Session: Session 1: 9:00 am – 9:50 am
Poster: 56
Abstract
In Mali, malaria is the primary cause of morbidity and mortality and many women are at risk for placental malaria (PM) during pregnancy. A previous study by Vincenz et al. (2022) analyzed risk factors for placental malaria including the anti-malarial drug sulfadoxine-pyrimethamine (SP) on birth outcomes in rural villages on the Bandiagara Escarpment and in the capital city of Bamako. Women who received no doses of SP during pregnancy tended not to have had primary school education and had the highest risk for low birth weight. Our study builds upon the previous one by testing for an adverse impact of PM on childhood growth. The sample includes 317 placental samples assessed for placental malaria from births to 249 mothers. The height and weight of the children was periodically measured until a mean age of 4 years. We used a linear mixed model in Python to investigate the relationship between PM and childhood growth. We expect to find that chronic PM was associated with the slowest childhood growth, followed by acute PM, when compared to the growth of children not infected by PM. Understanding the relationship between PM and childhood growth could promote the need for antenatal care such as SP and help to understand the long term effects of PM.
