Very Low Birthweight in African American Infants: The Role of Maternal Exposure to Interpersonal Racial Discrimination

OBJECTIVES: We determined whether African American women's lifetime exposure to interpersonal racial discrimination is associated with pregnancy outcomes. METHODS: We performed a case-control study among 104 African American women who delivered very low birthweight (2500 g) term infants in Chicago, Ill. RESULTS: The unadjusted and adjusted odds ratio of very low birthweight infants for maternal lifetime exposure to interpersonal racism in 3 or more domains equaled 3.2 (95% confidence intervals=1.5, 6.6) and 2.6 (1.2, 5.3), respectively. This association tended to persist across maternal sociodemographic, biomedical, and behavioral characteristics. CONCLUSIONS: The lifelong accumulated experiences of racial discrimination by African American women constitute an independent risk factor for preterm delivery.