Use of dietary supplements in relation to sociodemographic factors in pregnant women in the TEDDY study

Abstract

The Environmental Determinants of Diabetes in Youth (TEDDY) is a longitudinal study that aims to identify environmental exposures that may affect islet autoimmunity and the development of type 1 diabetes among children at high genetic risk. Participating mothers recalled dietary supplement use during pregnancy 3‐month postpartum. Descriptive analyses and chi‐square test were used to analyze data from 3,630 mothers in 4 countries. Over 90% of the mothers used at least 1 type of supplement during pregnancy (94% in the US, 85% in Finland, 93% in Germany, and 89% in Sweden, p<0.01). Among users, 48% took multivitamin/mineral (MVM), 16% took single supplements (SS), and others took both. Iron was the mostly taken SS in all TEDDY countries (n=1340), followed by calcium in the US, vitamin D in Finland, and folic acid in Germany and Sweden. Vitamin D‐containing MVM and SS were taken by 2,323 mothers, of them 49% were from the US. Among 456 fatty acid supplement users, 250 took the formulations without other nutrients. Probiotics users were 10‐fold more in the US and Finland than in Germany and Sweden. Overall, dietary supplement use was associated with higher education, non‐smoking, non‐drinking, and 1st‐child delivery (p<0.01). Sociodemographic factors did not notably affected the average duration of supplementation which ranged from 17.5 weeks for single iron product to 37.6 weeks for probiotics‐containing MVM.