Women who eat fish during pregnancy suffer less stress

Women who do not eat fish during pregnancy are more likely to experience high levels of anxiety at that time, researchers have revealed. They have found a link between the types of diet eaten, particularly whether this includes fish, and anxiety in pregnancy. The researchers suggest that eating fish during pregnancy could help reduce stress levels. Most women experience some stress during pregnancy but excessive anxiety is not good for the mother's long-term health and can result in their baby being born prematurely and/or having a low birth weight. Researchers from Children of the 90s at the University of Bristol and the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, looked at the fish intake of more than 9,500 pregnant women They categorised women's diets by the frequency with which different types of foods were eaten and identified five dietary patterns. They are roughly described as: health-conscious, traditional, processed, confectionery and vegetarian. The researchers found that women who never ate seafood had a 53 per cent greater likelihood of having high levels of anxiety at 32 weeks of pregnancy when compared with women who ate seafood regularly. The results suggest that two meals of white fish and one meal of oily fish each week would be an adequate amount of fish to consume. This was the case after taking into account 14 different factors that could affect anxiety, including drinking, smoking and family adversity during pregnancy. When the researchers investigated the dietary patterns, women in the top third of the vegetarian type of diet pattern were 25 per cent more likely to experience anxiety than women in the bottom third. There was also evidence that women in the top third of the health-conscious dietary pattern were 23 per cent less likely to have high levels of anxiety when compared with women in the bottom third. Women in the top third of the traditional diet pattern were 16 per cent less likely to have high levels of anxiety when compared with women in the bottom third. These findings, the researchers suggest, may be due to the lack of fish and meat in a vegetarian type of diet and because a pregnant woman's nutritional requirements increase during pregnancy, due to the demands of the growing foetus, which gets all its nutrients from the mother. Dr Juliana Vaz, the report's senior author, said: "An important message from this research is that in order to have a healthy pregnancy, women need to follow a healthy diet and not something special for pregnancy. "It means a diet containing whole cereals, vegetables, salad, fruit, dairy foods, meat, poultry, pulses and including fish - three portions per week with at least one of oily fish, such as salmon, sardine or tuna. "Sweets and fast foods should be kept to a minimum because they are low in nutrients." Article: 13th July 2013 www.news.ninemsn.com.au

Pregnant women with diabetes have higher risk of babies with birth defects

Pregnant women with diabetes are almost four times more likely to have a baby with a birth defect than women without the condition, warn researchers. Their findings suggest that higher blood sugar levels in the mother raise the risk. Around one in 13 babies born to a woman with type 1 or type 2 diabetes is affected by a major birth defect, such as heart disease and spina bifida. This compares with a risk of one in 50 for women without diabetes.
Doctors at the charity Diabetes UK, which funded the study, are urging women with diabetes who want to start a family to take advice about getting good glucose control first to minimise the risk. But they stressed that the vast majority of pregnancies in women with diabetes did not involve a birth defect.

The study, led by researchers at Newcastle University and the Regional Maternity Survey Office, looked at the outcomes of 401,149 pregnancies, including 1,677 pregnancies in women with diabetes, between 1996 and 2008 in the North of England. Researcher Ruth Bell told the journal Diabetologia: ‘The good news is that, with expert help before and during pregnancy, most women with diabetes will have a healthy baby.

'The risk of problems can be reduced by taking extra care to have the best possible glucose control before becoming pregnant.’ The study examined 401,149 pregnancies born between 1996 and 2008 'Any reduction in high glucose levels is likely to improve the chances of a healthy baby. ‘All young women with diabetes need to know about preparing for pregnancy, and should contact their doctor or diabetes team as soon as possible if they are thinking about pregnancy or become pregnant.’

Previous research shows having diabetes increases the chance of birth defects, but this is one of the first studies to quantify the effect of glucose levels on risk. Higher blood sugar levels can be reduced using lifestyle and diet, or changes to medication during pregnancy. Dr Iain Frame, Director of Research for Diabetes UK, said ‘The real message from this study is that the blood glucose level of the mother is important to the risk.

‘This study offers clear evidence that although women with diabetes might still have a higher risk of a birth defect, they can still do something positive to reduce that risk by carefully monitoring their blood glucose level and trying to reduce it if it is high. ‘We need to get the message out to women with diabetes that if they are considering becoming pregnant, then they should tell their diabetes healthcare team, who will make sure they are aware of planning and what next steps they should be taking.

‘Blood glucose control continues to be important throughout pregnancy and should be closely monitored to ensure the best result for the baby and this is why women should be as prepared as possible beforehand.’ He said women with diabetes who were sexually active but not planning a baby should use contraception. ‘This is because as well as high blood glucose levels increasing risk of birth defect, some medications taken by people with Type 2 diabetes can cause problems in the developing foetus and higher doses of folic acid are needed for women with diabetes to reduce the risk of complications such as spina bifida’ he added..

Birth defects include congenital heart disease and defects of the nervous system such as spina bifida. Many can be treated but some result in stillbirth or pregnancy loss or ongoing health problems. The study did not look at women who developed diabetes - gestational diabetes - during pregnancy.

Article: 6th February 2012 www.dailymail.co.uk

Coffee could pose a risk to pregnant women study reveals

Study reveals that high street coffee shops could pose a risk to pregnant women due to large variations in caffeine content. Analysis of espresso coffees from 20 shops found one with a caffeine content six times higher than another. Researchers from the University of Glasgow said customers were completely unaware of the caffeine levels in cups of coffee.

The Food Standards Agency (FSA) advise that pregnant women should restrict their average daily caffeine content to 200mg. But while a cup of coffee from Starbucks was found to have 51mg of caffeine, a Costa coffee had 157mg. The highest amount of caffeine was found in a cup from Glasgow-based Patisserie Francoise, which was serving 322mg in a single drink.

The FSA warn that too much caffeine could result in miscarriage or a baby having a lower birth weight, which can increase the risk of some health conditions in later life.

Alan Crozier, from the research team, said: "Despite the increasing number of coffee shops on the high street and in airports, there appear to be no recent publications on the caffeine contents of the various types of commercially prepared coffees. "This snap-shot of high street espresso coffees suggests the published assumption that a cup of strong coffee contains 50mg of caffeine may be misleading."

Researchers analysed coffees ranging in cup size from 23-70ml. Their findings are published in the latest edition of the Royal Society of Chemistry's Food and Function journal. Dr Crozier added that the size of the coffee was the most important influence to the amount of caffeine.

He said: "The main factor is that some places use a lot more coffee than other outlets to make an espresso, which is fine for some people but pregnant women could unwittingly consume more caffeine than is good for them while thinking they are well within their recommended limit."

Article: 1st December 2011 www.independent.co.uk