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Author Reply

Reply to “Adequate Vitamin D during Pregnancy Reduces the Risk of Premature Birth by Reducing Placental Colonization by Bacterial Vaginosis Species”

Raina N. Fichorova, Andrew B. Onderdonk, Hidemi Yamamoto, Mary L. Delaney, Andrea M. DuBois, Elizabeth Allred, Alan Leviton
Raina N. Fichorova
Laboratory of Genital Tract Biology Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women's Hospital Boston, Massachusetts, USA
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Andrew B. Onderdonk
Department of Pathology Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women’s Hospital Boston, Massachusetts, USA
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Hidemi Yamamoto
Laboratory of Genital Tract Biology Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women's Hospital Boston, Massachusetts, USA
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Mary L. Delaney
Department of Pathology Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women’s Hospital Boston, Massachusetts, USA
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Andrea M. DuBois
Department of Pathology Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women’s Hospital Boston, Massachusetts, USA
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Elizabeth Allred
Neuroepidemiology Unit Children’s Hospital of Boston Boston, Massachusetts, USA
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Alan Leviton
Neuroepidemiology Unit Children’s Hospital of Boston Boston, Massachusetts, USA
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DOI: 10.1128/mBio.00054-11
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We are very pleased that our paper has stirred so much thought and attention. We fully agree that vitamin D deficiency as a factor associated with bacterial vaginosis and susceptibility to infection should be thoroughly studied to explore its potential role as an easily modifiable cause of preterm birth and complications of prematurity (1). We hope future studies will address that.

To clarify, in our paper we investigated placental colonization with specific groups of bacteria as a mechanism to upregulate or downregulate the inflammatory condition in the extremely preterm newborn rather than as a risk factor for or a trigger of premature birth (2). The ELGAN study did not assess maternal levels of vitamin D.

It may well be that vitamin D deficiency affects fetal growth and development through its direct effect on systemic and mucosal innate immunity and inflammation (3–5) or through control of the growth, composition, ascendance, and pathogenicity of the maternal microflora (6). We and others continue to search for new ways to reduce the heavy burden of preterm birth for millions of children and families.

Raina N. Fichorova
Laboratory of Genital Tract Biology
Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology
Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women's Hospital
Boston, Massachusetts, USA

Andrew B. Onderdonk
Department of Pathology
Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women’s Hospital
Boston, Massachusetts, USA

Hidemi Yamamoto
Laboratory of Genital Tract Biology
Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology
Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women's Hospital
Boston, Massachusetts, USA

Mary L. Delaney
Andrea M. DuBois
Department of Pathology
Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women’s Hospital
Boston, Massachusetts, USA

Elizabeth Allred
Alan Leviton
Neuroepidemiology Unit
Children’s Hospital of Boston
Boston, Massachusetts, USA

  • Copyright © 2011 Fichorova et al.

This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported license, which permits unrestricted noncommercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

REFERENCES

  1. 1.↵
    1. Grant WB
    . 2011. Adequate vitamin D during pregnancy reduces the risk of premature birth by reducing placental colonization by bacterial vaginosis species. mBio 2:e00022-11.
  2. 2.↵
    1. Fichorova RN,
    2. et al
    . 2011. Maternal microbe-specific modulation of inflammatory response in extremely low-gestational-age newborns. mBio 2:e00280-10.
  3. 3.↵
    1. Hewison M
    . Antibacterial effects of vitamin D. Nat. Rev. Endocrinol. [Epub ahead of print.] doi: 10.1038/nrendo.2010.226.
  4. 4.↵
    1. Khoo AL,
    2. et al
    . 2011. Regulation of cytokine responses by seasonality of vitamin D status in healthy individuals. Clin. Exp. Immunol. 164:72–79.
    OpenUrlCrossRefPubMed
  5. 5.↵
    1. Liu N,
    2. et al
    . 2009. Vitamin D induces innate antibacterial responses in human trophoblasts via an intracrine pathway. Biol. Reprod. 80:398–406.
    OpenUrlAbstract/FREE Full Text
  6. 6.↵
    1. Hensel KJ,
    2. Randis TM,
    3. Gelber SE,
    4. Ratner AJ
    . 2011. Pregnancy-specific association of vitamin D deficiency and bacterial vaginosis. Am. J. Obstet. Gynecol. 204:41. e1–9.
    OpenUrlCrossRefPubMed
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Reply to “Adequate Vitamin D during Pregnancy Reduces the Risk of Premature Birth by Reducing Placental Colonization by Bacterial Vaginosis Species”
Raina N. Fichorova, Andrew B. Onderdonk, Hidemi Yamamoto, Mary L. Delaney, Andrea M. DuBois, Elizabeth Allred, Alan Leviton
mBio Apr 2011, 2 (2) e00054-11; DOI: 10.1128/mBio.00054-11

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Reply to “Adequate Vitamin D during Pregnancy Reduces the Risk of Premature Birth by Reducing Placental Colonization by Bacterial Vaginosis Species”
Raina N. Fichorova, Andrew B. Onderdonk, Hidemi Yamamoto, Mary L. Delaney, Andrea M. DuBois, Elizabeth Allred, Alan Leviton
mBio Apr 2011, 2 (2) e00054-11; DOI: 10.1128/mBio.00054-11
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