Pregnant women or women intending to get pregnant now have another important reason to take folate. All obstetricians tell their pregnant patients to immediately take folate. Folate - also known as folic acid as a supplement or when added to food is a B-group vitamin which is crucial for healthy fetus development and prevents neural tube defects in babies such as spina bfida and anencephaly.
Now, however, there's an added reason for pregnant women to not skip their daily folate intake and make sure that they're taking enough of the vitamin. If they don't want their children to develop obesity, they should take enough folate.
According to new research, children whose mothers had low folate concentrations when they were pregnant are at higher risk of developing obesity or becoming overweight.
A prospective birth cohort study from the Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore.
According to the research, there is an L-shaped association between maternal folate and childhood weight. Those at elevated risk are children born to mothers in the lowest quartile of folate concentration. Children with mothers who are obese but had high folate levels during pregnancy were at a lower risk.
The research findings underscore the necessity not only for pregnant women to take folate, but to take enough of it. The doctors behind the study made the recommendations for medical practitioners to establish and ensure optimal rather than minimal maternal folate concentrations for their parents so they can prevent adverse metabolic outcomes in their babies. This, they said, is particularly important for obese mothers who may not be getting enough folate.
The current prescription for mothers is 400 mcg of folic acid daily for at least one month before as well as during pregnancy as a means to prevent neural tube defects in their babies. Because folic acid may not be easily available in food sources, vitamins supplements of folic acid are important.
The study covered 1,517 mother-child pairs aged 28.6 for mothers and 6.2 for children. Exactly 29 per cent of the mothers were obese and 25 per cent were overweight. It was established that obese mothers tended to have lower folate. Almost 39 percent of the children were overweight or obese at ages 2 to 9.
