2025 PRESENTER PROFILES
New Perspectives on Fetal and Placental Responses to Diabetes and Its Treatment
Sunday, June 22, at 1:30 p.m. CT
Room W180 • McCormick Place Convention Center
What Causes Hyperemesis Gravidarum, and Can Metformin Prevent It?
Marlena Fejzo, PhD
Assistant Clinical Professor,
University of Southern California
What is your presentation about?
Hyperemesis gravidarum (HG), the most severe form of nausea and vomiting of pregnancy, is associated with adverse outcomes and even maternal and fetal death. Patients often limit their family size due to fear of recurrence. Recently we identified the main cause of HG is hypersensitivity to the emetogenic hormone GDF15. Metformin increases circulating levels of GDF15 and pre-pregnancy treatment may desensitize patients to its rapid rise during pregnancy, lowering the risk of severe symptoms and outcomes.
How do you hope your presentation will impact diabetes research or care?
We will provide evidence to support the theory that pre-pregnancy treatment of metformin may reduce the risk of severe nausea and vomiting of pregnancy. We hope that our presentation will encourage clinical trials using the approach and ultimately provide a novel treatment method to potentially prevent HG.
How did you become involved with this area of diabetes research or care?
After personally suffering a second trimester miscarriage due to severe nausea and vomiting of pregnancy, I decided to dedicate my career to identifying the cause of the condition with hopes of finding ways to prevent it and/or better treatment options. After discovering the genetic basis for the condition and elucidating the mechanism, we hypothesized that pre-pregnancy treatment with the diabetes drug metformin may provide an affordable and safe way to potentially prevent HG by desensitizing patients to the emetogenic hormone GDF15 prior to pregnancy and thereby reducing symptoms in pregnancy.
