No abstract

This study can be used to evaluate individual state surveillance data, and to help plan for public health care and educational needs. It also provides valuable data on racial/ethnic patterns of selected major birth defects.

PGDM was associated with a wide range of birth defects; GDM was associated with a limited group of birth defects.

To our knowledge, this is the first population-based study of its scale to examine prepregnancy obesity and a range of structural birth defects. These results suggest a weak to moderate positive association of maternal obesity with 7 of 16 categories of birth defects and a strong inverse association with gastroschisis. The mechanisms underlying these associations are not yet understood but may be related to undiagnosed diabetes.