Women in resource-poor neighborhoods are at higher gestational diabetes risk, UA researchers say

Researchers at the University of Arizona have found that mothers living in resource-poor neighborhoods in the state were 20% more likely to develop gestational diabetes mellitus.

Researchers with UA's Mel and Enid Zuckerman College of Public Health compared where women lived when they gave birth with values calculated from the Neighborhood Deprivation Index, which gives a score for how resource-rich or resource-poor a neighborhood is.

The score takes into account things like the median home value and the percent of households receiving public assistance. They examined more than 480,000 births in 15 Arizona counties between 2014 and 2020.

UA assistant professor Melissa Furlong said she hopes the findings will drive positive change.

“If we incorporated neighborhood quality into screening then maybe we could catch some of these women a little bit earlier or change our policies to make sure that they are screened better during pregnancy," Furlong said.

Furlong said researchers have seen over and over again that where people live has a direct impact on their health.

“We can dig down a little bit deeper and think about how living in food deserts, having walkable neighborhoods, access to high quality health care, all these things can affect your health," Furlong said. "So from a policy perspective, I think that we can focus on improving the quality of different neighborhoods.”