Wilfred Simons
Leiden
Identical twin babies do not always have equal developmental opportunities. In 10 to 15 percent of twin pregnancies, one of the two babies manages to get more nutrients from the joint placenta than the other. The ‘underlying’ baby can suffer lifelong developmental problems from such an unfavorable start, warns a research team from the LUMC.
The LUMC and the Willem-Alexander Children’s Hospital in Rotterdam are collaborating in a study into twin pregnancies, which is funded by the Heart Foundation. For this so-called LEMON study, PhD student Sophie Groene and child psychologist Jeanine van Klink examined 48 twin pairs between the ages of 4 and 17 with a growth difference. All these twins were born in the LUMC. The comparison showed that the children who were smaller at birth also had other disadvantages. They are less intelligent than their bigger siblings and are more likely to have motor developmental delays.
The results are not very surprising; they confirm what parents and researchers already see in everyday life.
Attention
Van Klink and Groene believe that more long-term care and attention should be paid to the smaller baby in particular. “Only then can we detect development problems early and offer support if necessary,” says Van Klink in a press release from the LUMC. Parents also benefit from this, because they too can do the necessary to help their smaller twin baby develop properly.
About 3,000 twins are born in the Netherlands every year. One third of them are monozygotic. The differences can be large at birth. The dominant baby is sometimes twice the size of the other. Visually, Van Klink says that it seems as if one baby went through the Hunger Winter, while the other lived in the Bahamas. Even more conclusions can be drawn from the LEMON data, says Sophie Groene, about growth curves and the development of the heart and lungs, among other things. Groen and Van Klink have published their results in the British scientific journal The Lancet Child & Adolescent Health.