Professor Claire Roberts is anincredible woman with seeminglyindestructible optimism and animmense love for her family.But the alumna leading the fight againstpregnancy complications has a heartbreakingstory of unimaginable loss.Five days after giving birth to her son in thesummer of 1983, Claire lost her baby after itwas discovered his heart effectively had no leftventricle.“It was very traumatic, complicated by thefact we lived on a farm and the next day wasFebruary 16 which was Ash Wednesday andour farm was burnt out. There was more tocome, we had a terrible year,” she said.Despite this harrowing time, Claire showedimmense resilience and went on to have twodaughters, Annie and Kelly, completed herScience Degree with Honours, obtained a PhDand then moved into obstetrics where she hasbecome one of the country’s leading pregnancyand birth researchers.As Deputy Director of the Robinson ResearchInstitute, which is internationally recognisedfor excellence in fertility, pregnancy and childhealth research, Claire has made discoveriesthat have gained worldwide media attention.And there will be more attention to come.Claire and her team have developed a worldfirst test to determine which women are at riskof preeclampsia, a life threatening conditionwhere abnormally high blood pressure andother serious complications develop duringpregnancy.The test can also identify women at risk ofgestational diabetes, spontaneous pre-term birthand intrauterine growth restriction.“Our screening tools, or algorithms, can predictrisk for these four complications with a bloodtest and simple questions at 12 weeks ofgestation,” said Claire.“We’ve been able to validate these algorithms inthe first 500 women in our Screening Tests toPredict Poor Outcomes of Pregnancy (STOP)study which is very exciting.”With the Hospital Research Foundation’ssupport, the test will soon be trialled for oneyear in the Lyell McEwin Hospital which hasthe highest rate of preeclampsia of any urbanhospital in Australia.“Having an algorithm to predict risk inpregnancy allows early intervention.For example, it’s been shown that if you start a34THE UNIVERSITY OF ADELAIDEABOVEProfessor ClaireRoberts withdaughter Kelly andgrandchildren“It’s important toempower women to actuallytake control of their healthwhile they’re still young.”low dose aspirin every day before 16 weeks’gestation, you can prevent early onsetpreeclampsia,” said Claire.“There are also other interventions for theother pregnancy complications, so the idea isif you intervene and provide early treatment,you’ll either prevent the condition altogether orameliorate the severity.“We hope to get our screening tools into clinicalpractice very soon to identify women early inpregnancy who are at risk, then prevent thecomplications that will impact their health andthe health of their babies.”Claire highlights the fact that health inpregnancy foreshadows future health andbelieves it’s important to educate couples about
It seems that your browser's pop-up blocker has prevented us from opening a new window/tab. Please click the button below to open the link manually.
