Pregnancy Problems May Have Role in ADHD

Some problems in pregnancy and birth increase a child’s odds of having an attention disorder, a new study suggests. Researchers from Australia did the study. They used data on nearly 13,000 children. Records showed that they were taking medicine for attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Researchers also looked at information from a pregnancy database. Then they randomly chose another 30,000 children from that database. This group was used for comparison. Mothers of children with ADHD were more likely to have smoked or had a urinary tract infection while they were pregnant. Some problems related to labor also occurred more often for children with ADHD. They were more likely to have been born after induced labor. Threats of going into early labor also were more common. Their mothers also were more likely to have had a problem called preeclampsia during pregnancy.