Objective To evaluate the impact of psychosocial stress during pregnancy on infant health outcomes in the first postnatal year. Methods A sample of 3000 women completed a stress inventory (the Psychosocial Hassles Scale) during their third trimester before first childbirth. Infant health outcomes were measured via maternal report at 1, 6 and 12 months postpartum. Poisson regression was used to model the effect of maternal stress during pregnancy on infant health outcomes in the first year, controlling for age, race/ethnicity, education, insurance coverage, marital status, and cigarette smoking during pregnancy. Results Women who were younger, minority, unmarried, publicly insured and without a college degree were more likely to report high levels of prenatal stress. High prenatal stress was a significant predictor of maternal reporting of gastrointestinal illness (p<0.0001), respiratory illness (p=0.025), and total illness in the first year (p< 0.0001). High prenatal stress was also a significant predictor of urgent care visits (p< 0.0001) and emergency department visits (p= 0.001). It was not a significant predictor of hospitalizations (p= 0.36). Conclusions Maternal prenatal stress is associated with increased maternal reporting of infant illness, as well as increased frequency of both urgent care visits and emergency department visits.

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