Abstract
Most studies linking maternal diet with offspring adiposity have focused on single nutrients or foods, but a dietary pattern approach is more representative of the overall diet. We thus aimed to investigate the relations between maternal dietary patterns and offspring adiposity in a multi-ethnic Asian mother–offspring cohort in Singapore. We derived maternal dietary patterns using maternal dietary intake information at 26–28 weeks of gestation, of which associations with offspring body mass index (BMI), abdominal circumference (AC), subscapular skinfold (SS), and triceps skinfold (TS) were assessed using longitudinal data analysis (linear mixed effects (LME)) and multiple linear regression at ages 0, 3, 6, 9, 12, 15, 18, 24, 36, 48, and 54 months. Three dietary patterns were derived: (1) vegetables-fruit-and-white rice (VFR); (2) seafood-and-noodles (SfN); and (3) pasta-cheese-and-bread (PCB). In the LME model adjusting for potential confounders, each standard deviation (SD) increase in maternal VFR pattern score was associated with 0.09 mm lower offspring TS. Individual time-point analysis additionally revealed that higher VFR score was generally associated with lower postnatal offspring BMI z-score, TS, SS, and sum of skinfolds (SS + TS) at ages 18 months and older. Maternal adherence to a dietary pattern characterized by higher intakes of fruit and vegetables and lower intakes of fast food was associated with lower offspring adiposity.
Highlights
IntroductionOverweight and obese children are more likely to become overweight and obese as adults, and have higher risk of stroke, heart disease, and type 2 diabetes in adulthood [2]
The prevalence of childhood obesity has risen at an alarming rate [1]
In a small subset of participants (n = 212), information about late pregnancy maternal diet using a 3-day food diary was available; we have previously shown that similar dietary patterns were extracted from this subset, and that the correlation coefficients of the dietary pattern scores were moderately strong (Pearson’s correlation coefficients (r) > 0.5, p < 0.001) [33,34]
Summary
Overweight and obese children are more likely to become overweight and obese as adults, and have higher risk of stroke, heart disease, and type 2 diabetes in adulthood [2]. The theory of in utero exposure having a lifelong influence on offspring health, initially proposed by Barker and colleagues [5], has been increasingly substantiated by evidence from both epidemiological and experimental studies [6]. It has been reported that in utero famine exposure is associated with increased risks of obesity [7], coronary heart disease [8], and hypertension [9] during adulthood. More recent studies suggested that less severe prenatal nutritional challenges (e.g., suboptimal macronutrient balance [10]) can impart long-term influence on offspring, with epigenetic alterations proposed to be a major underlying mechanism [11]
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