13/10/2024
Don’t Wait Until Pregnancy to Pay Attention to Diet and Prenatal Supplements – Here’s Why
Newly pregnant women often hurry to get on prenatal supplements as soon as they discover they are pregnant. While they certain should do that, it is often too late to provide some preventive benefits of multivitamins which are crucial BEFORE conception. In the opinion of many experts, all women of childbearing age should be on a good multivitamin in addition to a healthy diet.
A study published in the American Journal of Epidemiology showed that the use of multivitamin supplements by women prior to becoming pregnant was associated with fewer preterm deliveries. Preterm birth is defined as birth at less than 37 weeks of gestation and is associated with a lower rate of infant survival during the first year of life.
Researchers utilized data from the Pregnancy, Infection and Nutrition Study which recruited 2,010 women during their 24 to 29 week of pregnancy. They compared the incidence of preterm delivery among women who took multivitamins prior to conception, before conception and during pregnancy, during pregnancy only, or not at all.
Women who took a multivitamin supplement before conception had half the risk of early and late preterm delivery than those who took no vitamins. Women who used multivitamins only during pregnancy had approximately the same amount of preterm births when compared to women who took none at all.
This study, as well as many previous studies, reinforces the concern that waiting until pregnancy is confirmed may be too late for nutritional intervention to benefit many pregnancy outcomes.
https://academic.oup.com/aje/article/160/9/886/86599