Enhanced Neonatal Health and Neonatal Cardiac Effect Developmentally
Public ClinicalTrials.gov record NCT03517293. Field values are reproduced from the official study page; the official ClinicalTrials.gov record remains the source of truth for eligibility, enrollment, and contact information.
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Brief summary
Reproduced verbatim from the official ClinicalTrials.gov record. Not medical advice.
AHA and ACSM recognize lack of exercise is a major risk factor for developing cardiovascular disease (CVD), and other CVD risk factors such as obesity. It is important to note that CVD is the sixth leading cause of death and children are more likely to be undiagnosed due to their age and lack of symptoms. Further, according to the CDC, over one-third of children and adolescents are overweight or obese and at increased risk of CVD. Although many programs for children aim to decrease CVD risks and obesity few, if any, programs begin the intervention during prenatal development. Our preliminary findings suggest that regular maternal exercise improves cardiovascular health (lower heart rate, increased heart rate variability), normalizes body fat composition, and improves nervous system and motor tone even after birth. Norepinephrine is essential for fetal development, influences many tissues (heart, nerve cells, skeletal muscle, and fat cells), and can stimulate growth factors. It is believed that exercise hormones, such as norepinephrine, released during maternal exercise influence these growth factors during development. The central hypothesis of this proposal is that regular maternal exercise during pregnancy will improve the health of offspring before and after birth as evidenced by lower resting heart rate, increasing heart rate variability improved neurological maturation, and decreased adiposity. We have three specific aims to test this hypothesis through the Enhanced Neonatal Health and Neonatal Cardiovascular Efficiency Developmentally (ENHANCED) by Mom project (IRB approved #12-002524). Aim 1 will establish the association between maternal exercise during pregnancy and the heart health of offspring before and after birth. Aim 2 will determine the relationship between modes of regular maternal exercise and neonate neurological and muscular maturation as this relates to health of the child after birth. Aim 3 will elucidate the influence of different modes of maternal exercise during pregnancy on fetal and infant body composition as this relates to risk of obesity and CVD disease. These studies will provide novel insight into how different types of maternal exercise during pregnancy influence the overall health of offspring. Furthermore, these findings may have significant implications on the public health as it may provide evidence of pregnancy as the earliest intervention for attenuating cardiovascular disease risk of children.
Study identification
- NCT ID
- NCT03517293
- Recruitment status
- Completed
- Study type
- Interventional
- Phase
- Not applicable
- Enrollment
- 133 participants
Conditions and interventions
Conditions
Eligibility (public fields only)
- Age range
- 18 Years to 35 Years
- Sex
- Female
- Healthy volunteers
- Accepts healthy volunteers
This page does not interpret eligibility. Detailed inclusion and exclusion criteria are on the official ClinicalTrials.gov record.
Study timeline
- Start date
- Jun 30, 2015
- Primary completion
- Jan 29, 2023
- Completion
- Jan 29, 2023
- Last update posted
- Aug 7, 2023
2015 – 2023
United States locations
- U.S. sites
- 1
- U.S. states
- 1
- U.S. cities
- 1
| Facility | City | State | ZIP | Site status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| East Carolina University | Greenville | North Carolina | 27834 | — |
Site contact phone numbers, emails, and investigator names are intentionally not displayed here. Open the official ClinicalTrials.gov record for site contact information.
About this trial record page
- What this page shows
- Public field values for ClinicalTrials.gov record NCT03517293, including study identification, conditions, interventions, eligibility (age, sex, healthy volunteer), timeline, and U.S. site list.
- What this page does not do
- No medical advice, eligibility judgments, treatment recommendations, study quality scoring, or AI-generated medical summaries. No site contact phone numbers, emails, or investigator names.
- Where the data comes from
- Sourced from the official ClinicalTrials.gov public API. The official record is the source of truth.
- Last refresh
- Last update posted Aug 7, 2023 · Synced Sep 22, 2026
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Open the official record
The complete protocol, eligibility criteria, and contact information for NCT03517293 live on ClinicalTrials.gov.