Jada Loleng

Methamphetamine abuse during pregnancy has been linked to negative outcomes in offspring, including abnormalities in brain structure, cognitive and executive functioning, and increased risk of mental disorders such as ADHD. Prenatal methamphetamine exposure (PME) can co-occur with adverse childhood experiences (ACEs), which can further impact cognitive development. This three-phase study aimed to investigate the impact of PME and ACEs on cognitive outcomes by creating a database using electronic health records collected from the University of Minnesota's Adoption Medicine Clinic (AMC). A merged dataset of 123 patients, containing the manual database entries and WISC-V assessment results, was used for statistical analysis. The first phase investigated cognitive performance differences in children exposed to methamphetamine prenatally, those exposed to other substances, and those with no exposure. Contrary to the hypothesis, no significant differences in Full-Scale Intelligence Quotient (FSIQ) scores were found between the three groups, suggesting that prenatal methamphetamine exposure may not have a distinctive impact on cognitive development. The second phase examined the effect of ACEs on cognitive outcomes. While no significant disparities in FSIQ scores were found between children with no ACEs and those with varying levels of ACE exposure, individual analysis of each ACE demonstrated that children who experienced physical abuse (p = 0.0055) and emotional abuse (p = 0.046) had significantly lower FSIQ scores than those who did not. There were no significant results in the third phase of the project, which aimed to explore the relationship between FSIQ scores and the co-occurrence of PME and ACEs. The findings of our study indicate that the relationship between prenatal drug exposure and ACEs and their impact on cognitive development is complex and requires further investigation to better understand the potential cognitive risks associated with exposure in children.