Mothers everywhere might be pleased to hear they could get grandchildren a little sooner than they expected.
Scientists have found that women who give birth at 25 years old are likely to live longer, a new study from the University of Seoul in South Korea reported.
After surveying more than 4,000 women, the research team found that having children before or after the mid-20s increased the risk of dying by 5 percent, according to the findings published in the medical journal Maturitas.
Specifically, they linked older childbearing ages with an uptick in cardiovascular disease, as well as “all-cause mortality.”
The trend of data was “U-shaped,” signifying that the risk of earlier death was greater the further the women were from their mid-20s.
Researchers suggested that younger mothers were less likely to be in situations that cause an increased risk of physical or mental illnesses, and that childbirth puts more strain on older mothers.
Of the 4,044 women participants, the researchers compared 1,398 women who gave birth between 20 and 23, as well as 1,033 who first gave birth at 24 and 25 and 1,513 who had babies between the ages 26 and 36. They followed up with all three sample groups 18 years later.
Out of all the mothers throughout the course the study, 243 women died, with a majority of them falling in the younger mother population and one third in the older.
When studying survival rates of both cardiovascular disease and all-cause death, the sweet spot of 24 to 25 years was most resilient. Survival rates for heart attacks and strokes was 97.3% for the younger mom demographic, 99.6% for women in their mid-20s and 98.7% for older mothers 18 years after the birth of their first child.
While the study was limited to the South Korean cities of Ansan and Anseong, the average childbearing age of first-time mothers in the US hit the researcher’s sweet spot at 26, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Epidemiology expert Sangshin Park, a professor at the University of Seoul, said younger mothers could have poorer health with childbearing because of socio-economic disparities, the Daily Mail reported.
“In general, young people from disadvantaged backgrounds were at higher risk of having children in their teens,” he said, while older women could have more physical trouble with childbirth. “Elderly mothers have more difficulty recovering from pregnancy and childbirth than younger mothers, and their muscles may not be able to function as before.”
Younger first-time moms have been linked to obesity and depression, said Park, while older first-time moms struggle to maintain regular exercise — both of which contribute to life expectancy.
“Busy daily routines could also lead to a lack of exercise and obesity and working and child-rearing stress may raise mother’s blood pressure,” he said.
The researchers at the University of Seoul said their study had many limitations, including the inability to analyze women under 20 and over 35 years of age, as well as their smaller sample size geographically. They also did not know if the women smoked before becoming mothers, which could have impacted their findings.
In conclusion, the study authors wrote that more research is necessary to confirm their speculations, but that the importance of their data should not be overlooked because of the rise in childbearing age.
In the US, the average age of first-time mothers used to be 21, and the slight increase of childbearing age among younger generations could be linked to the cost of childbirth, career aspirations and overall health considerations.
“The importance of the association between age at first childbearing and mortality is expected to continue to rise due to the current social and economic conditions which encourage women to postpone marriage, pursue higher education and participate in the paid workforce,” the researchers wrote.