Abstract
Developmental origins of health and disease (DOHaD) focuses on the earliest stages of human development, and provides a novel paradigm to complement other strategies for lifelong prevention of common chronic health conditions. The 3rd International Congress on DOHaD, held in 2005, retained the most popular features from the first two biannual Congresses, while adding a number of innovations, including increased emphasis on implications of DOHaD for the developing world; programs for trainees and young investigators; and new perspectives, including developmental plasticity, influences of social hierarchies, effects of prematurity, and populations in transition. Emerging areas of science included, first, the controversial role of infant weight gain in predicting adult obesity, diabetes, and cardiovascular disease. Second, in the era of epidemic obesity, paying attention to the over-nourished fetus is as important as investigating the growth retarded one. Third, environmental toxins appear to have abroad range of long-lasting effects on the developing human. Fourth, epigenetic mechanisms could unite several strands of human and animal observations, and explain how genetically identical individuals raised in similar postnatal environments can nonetheless develop widely differing phenotypes. Improving the environment to which an individual is exposed during development may be as important as any other public health effort to enhance population health world wide.
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The DOHaD Planning Committee is grateful for major financial support from the US National Institutes of Health (grants R13 HD 051239, K24 HL 068041), USAID (grant HRN-A-00-98-00027-00 through the Human Nutrition Institute of the International Life Sciences Institute), Journal of Physiology, the USDA Agricultural Research Service and Baylor College of Medicine. Additional support from Ajinomoto, Arbor Clinical Nutrition Updates, Association of Professors of Gynecology and Obstetrics of Canada, Astellas, Bank of England, British Heart Foundation, CABI, Canadian Institutes of Health Research, Center for Pregnancy and Newborn Research, General Mills, Gynaecologists of Canada, Harvard Medical School, Harvard Pilgrim Health Care Foundation, Lippencott Williams & Wilkins, London Health Sciences Centre, March of Dimes, Mead Johnson, Mt. Sinai Hospital Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Nestle, NY University, Ross Pediatrics, The Micronutrient Initiative, Unilever, University of Alberta Perinatal Research Center, University of Toronto Faculty of Medicine, University of Western Ontario Children's Hospital, University of Western Ontario Princess Anne Hospital, US Environmental Protection Agency (grant X3-832770-01-0), and Wellcome Trust.
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Gillman, M., Barker, D., Bier, D. et al. Meeting Report on the 3rd International Congress on Developmental Origins of Health and Disease (DOHaD). Pediatr Res 61, 625–629 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1203/pdr.0b013e3180459fcd
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1203/pdr.0b013e3180459fcd
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