A new research has found that babies born to women having pre-eclampsia, a pregnancy complication, can be at increased risk of having heart defects. It shall be noted that the researchers have found the risk to be very low.

In only around 0.1% of newborns more serious heart defects who were born to mothers who had the condition. Nathalie Auger from Canada's University of Montreal Hospital Research Centre said that when infants of mothers who witnessed late-onset of preeclampsia in comparison to those with early onset before 34 weeks gestation were at increased risk (2.78 fold more) of having critical heart defects and 5.55-fold more noncritical heart defects.

The researchers said, “This study provides novel evidence of a relationship between preeclampsia and congenital heart defects, powered by data for a large population of pregnant women”.

Auger affirmed that the congenital heart defects are rare and the risk factors are also not clear, but then also doctors must keep in mind when they handle preeclampsia cases. The researchers have recommended clinical care along with ultrasound screening and pulse oximetry of infants.

The researchers have based their findings on the basis of data of more than 1.9 million mother-daughter pairs taken from hospital discharge entries in Quebec's province-wide database. As per the assessment of data, it has been found that overall prevalence of heart defects was 8.9 per 1,000 infants. Auger suggested to take folic acid before and during early pregnancy.