Asthma and eczema in children born to women with migraine
T. C. Chen and A. Leviton
Biometry and Field Studies Branch, National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD 20892.
Migraine and asthma have been reported to occur in the same person more
commonly than would be expected if they are independent. The large
Collaborative Perinatal Project provided an opportunity to see if children
born to women with migraine or with the group of disorders characterized by
asthma and/or allergies were more likely to manifest asthma or eczema in
the first 7 years of life. Among children whose mothers had neither
migraine nor asthma/allergies, 3.2% had asthma. Of children whose mothers
had migraine, but not asthma/allergies, more than 6% had asthma. The risk
of asthma among children born to women who had both migraine and
asthma/allergies was greater than the risk associated with each maternal
disease. The risk of eczema in children was not appreciably influenced by
the mother's propensity to migraine or asthma/allergies. The results of
this first study of migraine in one generation and asthma in the next lead
to the conclusion that the two disorders are probably related.
