Table 3.
ALSPAC: Characteristics of study participants by age 8 high and low insulin group. Number of participants in each group are noted in the table when they differ from the overall insulin groups.
| Characteristics | Group | Low Insulin (N=641) |
High Insulin (N=216) |
p | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| % | n | % | n | |||
| Sex | Male | 53.0 | 340 | 52.8 | 114 | 0.946 |
| Ethnic background | White | 97.1 | 606/624 | 98.1 | 205/209 | 0.619 |
| Non-White | 3.0 | 18/624 | 2.0 | 4/209 | ||
| Maternal asthma | Yes | 14.6 | 91/624 | 14.4 | 30/208 | 0.955 |
| Maternal smoking, last 2 months of pregnancy | Yes | 11.8 | 74/630 | 13.2 | 28/211 | 0.557 |
| Maternal age at delivery | <20 years | 1.4 | 9/641 | 1.4 | 3/216 | |
| 20–36 years | 92.0 | 590/641 | 92.6 | 200/216 | ||
| >36 years | 6.6 | 42/641 | 6.0 | 13/216 | 0.967 | |
| Ever breastfed in the first 6 months | Yes | 84.3 | 525/623 | 83.9 | 177/211 | 0.895 |
| Day care attendance during the first year | Yes | 8.9 | 55/616 | 7.0 | 14/201 | 0.385 |
| Pets ownership during the first year | Yes | 67.3 | 417/620 | 70.8 | 143/202 | 0.349 |
| Maternal smoking at 8 months after birth | Yes | 16.4 | 102/622 | 15.9 | 33/207 | 0.877 |
| Characteristics, age 8 | ||||||
| BMI 1 , UK z-score (SD) | Mean (95%CI) | 0.21 (0.13, 0.28) | 637 | 0.73 (0.59, 0.88) | 216 | <0.001 |
| BHR 1 | Yes | 15.3 | 94/613 | 14.4 | 29/201 | 0.946 |
| Asthma | Yes | 14.5 | 80/553 | 22.5 | 41/182 | 0.011 |
| Skin test positivity | Yes | 23.0 | 131/569 | 22.7 | 44/194 | 0.922 |
| Total IgE, IU/mL | GM (95%CI) | 72.0 (62.0, 83.6) | 483 | 84.4 (65.1, 109) | 151 | 0.303 |
1
BMI included as z-scores from UK reference tables; BHR included as highest tertile with positive methacholine challenge(40)
Abbreviations: BMI - body mass index; BHR - bronchial hyper-responsiveness; IgE - immunoglobulin E; GM - geometric mean