Pregnancy and diabetes: a survey.

A survey of some of the problems involved in pregnancy complicated by diabetes based on 34 years of experience from the Copenhagen centre is presented. The importance of centralization of the management is emphasized. The perinatal mortality among 1885 infants of diabetic mothers born in the period 1946 to 78 is analysed; during the years a significant decrease from 22.1 to 4.4% is demonstrated. Congenital malformations are now counting for 50% of the perinatal death in diabetic pregnancies. Among infants whose mothers outside pregnancy attended two hospitals specialized in the treatment and ambulatory control of diabetes the rate of major congenital malformations was significantly reduced compared to infants of mothers whose diabetes outside pregnancy were controlled elsewhere (5.6% and 12.2% respectively). The findings suggest that poor diabetic control outside pregnancy might be teratogenic.