Risk of schizophrenia in adults born after obstetric complications and their association with early onset illness: a control study

O'Callaghan E, Gibson T

1992

Ireland

Study of the background of 65 schizophrenic patients. The main outcome was the presence of one or more obstetrical complications recorded in maternity notes of patients and controls. Patients with schizophrenia were significantly more likely than controls to have experienced at least one obstetric complication. Fetal distress was the only complication to occur to significant individual excess (present in five patients, absent in controls). Male patients were more vulnerable. The inclusion of multiple variables suggest that obstetric complications may be secondary to yet earlier events.

Increasing and converging evidence suggests that anomalies develop prenatally in schizophrenia. It is likely that those destined to become schizophrenic are already more fragile when labour starts.