Giant cell arteritis and thyroid dysfunction: multicentre case-control study. The Groupe de Recherche sur l'Artériteá Cellules Géantes.

Friedman et al examined 156 children 23 to 62 months after births associated with spontaneous labour, labour induced with oxytocin, or labour induced with dinoprostone. The prevalence of neurological or developmental abnormalities not attributable to events after delivery was the same overall in induced and spontaneous labours, but those abnormalities occurring after induction of labour all followed use of oxytocin. Our data indicate that exposure to uterotonic drugs does not substantially affect cognitive function 20 years later. A small difference due to non-differential misclassification, however, cannot be ruled out. A strength of our study is the large size, the population based design, and complete ascertainment. It is unlikely that selection bias and confounding explain the lack of association. Contributors: HTS, KJR, and MWG in collaboration with SS initiated the establishment and design of the cohort. HTS initiated this study and discussed the hypothesis with KJR. HTS and FHS analysed the data. PF collected the outcome data. SS linked the data to the birth registry. All authors participated in the interpretation of the findings. HTS, KJR and FHS wrote the first draft of the paper. All participated in editing the paper. HTS is guarantor of the paper. Funding: Helsefonden (grant No 11/064-94), the EU Biomed II programme (contract No BMH4-CT97-2430), Aarhus University Research Foundation (F-1996-SUN-1-77), and Danish Medical Research Council (grant No 9700677). The activities of the Danish Epidemiology Science Centre are financed by a grant from the Danish National Research Foundation. Conflict of interest: None declared.