During pregnancy, a woman is
barraged with what foods are safe to eat and in what quantities. A new study by
European researchers has found that high fish intake during pregnancy is
associated with a risk of overweight and obesity in her offspring. The
findings were published online on February 15 in the journal JAMA Pediatrics.
FDA Updates Advice on Eating Fish for Pregnant Women,Children |
Source: HEALTH
AND WELLNESS BLOG INDIA
The study authors note
that maternal fish intake in pregnancy has been reported to influence fetal
growth; however, the extent to which fish intake affects childhood growth and
obesity remains unclear. Therefore, they conducted a study to assess whether
fish intake in pregnancy is associated with offspring growth and the risk of
childhood overweight
and obesity.
The study group comprised
a total of 26,184 pregnant women and their children (singleton deliveries) from
1996 through 2011 who resided in Belgium, France, Greece, Ireland, Italy, the
Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Spain, and Massachusetts. The children
were followed-up at two-year intervals until the age of six years. The
investigators measured their body mass index percentiles from three months
after birth to six years of age. They defined rapid infant growth as a weight
gain z score greater than 0.67 from birth to two years and childhood
overweight/obesity at four and six years as Body Mass Index (BMI) in the 85th
percentile or higher for age and sex. (A Z-Score is a statistical measurement
of a score's relationship to the average in a group of scores. (A Z-score of 0
means the score is the same as the average. A Z-score can also be positive or
negative, indicating whether it is above or below the average and by how many
standard deviations.)
The investigators found
that the average fish intake during pregnancy ranged from 0.5 times/week in
Belgium to 4.45 times per week in Spain. Women who consumed fish more than
three times per week during pregnancy gave birth to offspring with higher BMI
values from infancy through middle childhood compared to women with lower fish
intake (three times per week or less). High fish intake during pregnancy (more
than three times/week) was associated with increased risk of rapid infant
growth (22% increased risk) and increased risk of offspring overweight/obesity
at four years (14% increased risk) and six years (22% increased risk) compared
to an intake of once per week or less. In addition, the effect of high fish
intake during pregnancy on rapid infant growth was greater among girls (31%
increased risk) than among boys (11% increased risk).
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