Vitamin D intake inadequate during pregnancy
Feb 27, 2007 - 11:01:07 PM
, Reviewed by: Dr. Sanjukta Acharya
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"Our study shows that current vitamin D dietary intake recommendations are not enough to meet the demands of pregnancy," Dr. Bodnar said. "Improving vitamin D status has tremendous capacity to benefit public health."
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Key Points of this article
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Bone development during fetal development is affected by Vitamin D; and a shortage of this leads to rickets and impairs skeletal development during the whole lifespan.
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More than 80 percent of African-American women and nearly half of white women tested at delivery had low Vitamin D levels.
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By University of Pittsburgh Schools of the Health Sciences,
[RxPG] Even regular use of prenatal multivitamin supplements is not adequate to prevent vitamin D insufficiency, University of Pittsburgh researchers report in the current issue of the Journal of Nutrition, the publication of the American Society for Nutrition. A condition linked to rickets and other musculoskeletal and health complications, vitamin D insufficiency was found to be widespread among women during pregnancy, particularly in the northern latitudes.
"In our study, more than 80 percent of African-American women and nearly half of white women tested at delivery had levels of vitamin D that were too low, even though more than 90 percent of them used prenatal vitamins during pregnancy," said Lisa Bodnar, Ph.D., M.P.H., R.D., assistant professor of epidemiology at the University of Pittsburgh Graduate School of Public Health (GSPH) and lead author of the study. "The numbers also were striking for their newborns 92.4 percent of African-American babies and 66.1 percent of white infants were found to have insufficient vitamin D at birth."
A vitamin closely associated with bone health, vitamin D deficiency early in life is associated with rickets a disorder characterized by soft bones and thought to have been eradicated in the United States more than 50 years ago as well as increased risk for type 1 diabetes, asthma and schizophrenia.
"A newborn's vitamin D stores are completely reliant on vitamin D from the mother," observed Dr. Bodnar, who also is an assistant investigator at the university-affiliated Magee-Womens Research Institute (MWRI). "Not surprisingly, poor maternal vitamin D status during pregnancy is a major risk factor for infant rickets, which again is becoming a major health problem."
For their study, Dr. Bodnar and her colleagues evaluated data that was collected on 200 black women and 200 white women who were randomly selected from more than 2,200 women enrolled in the MWRI's Pregnancy Exposures and Preeclampsia Prevention Study between 1997 and 2001. Samples of maternal blood were collected prior to 22 weeks pregnancy and again just before delivery, Samples of newborn umbilical cord blood also were tested for 25 hydroxyvitamin D, an indicator of vitamin D status. Finding such a proliferation of vitamin D insufficiency in spite of prenatal multivitamin use is troubling, she noted, suggesting that higher dosages, differing vitamin formulations or a moderate increase in sunlight exposure might be necessary to boost vitamin D stores to healthier levels.
"In both groups, vitamin D concentrations were highest in summer and lowest in winter and spring," said senior author James M. Roberts, M.D., MWRI director and professor and vice chair of research in the department of obstetrics, gynecology and reproductive sciences at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. "But differences were smaller between seasons for African-American mothers and babies, whose vitamin D deficiency remained more constant."
Since vitamin D is made by the body in reaction to sunlight exposure, it has long been known that vitamin D deficiency is more common among darker-skinned individuals, particularly in more northern latitudes, where less ultraviolet radiation reaches the Earth. Indeed, vitamin D deficiency is more than three times as common in winter than in summer for all women of childbearing age in the United States. Even so, the Pittsburgh researchers' study is cause for concern.
"This study is among the largest to examine these questions in this at-risk population," Marjorie L. McCullough, Sc.D., senior epidemiologist at the American Cancer Society, wrote in an accompanying editorial. "By the end of pregnancy, 90 percent of all women were taking prenatal vitamins and yet deficiency was still common."
Vitamin D is found naturally in fatty fish but few other foods. Primary dietary sources include fortified foods such as milk and some ready-to-eat cereals and vitamin supplements. Sun exposure for skin synthesis of vitamin D also remains critical.
"Our study shows that current vitamin D dietary intake recommendations are not enough to meet the demands of pregnancy," Dr. Bodnar said. "Improving vitamin D status has tremendous capacity to benefit public health."
Publication:
Journal of Nutrition
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Funding information and declaration of competing interests:
The study was funded by the National Institutes of Health.
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About Dr. Sanjukta Acharya
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This news story has been reviewed by Dr. Sanjukta Acharya before its publication on RxPG News website. Dr. Sanjukta Acharya, MBBS is the chief editor for RxPG News website. She oversees all the medical news submissions and manages the medicine section of the website. She has a special interest in diabetes and endocrinology.
RxPG News is committed to promotion and implementation of Evidence Based Medical Journalism in all channels of mass media including internet.
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Additional information about the news article
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University of Pittsburgh Schools of the Health Sciences -Founded in 1948 and fully accredited by the Council on Education for Public Health, GSPH is world-renowned for contributions that have influenced public health practices and medical care for millions of people. One of the top-ranked schools of public health in the United States, GSPH was the first fully accredited school of public health in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, with alumni who are among the leaders in their fields of public health. A member of the Association of Schools of Public Health, GSPH currently ranks third among schools of public health in NIH funding received. The only school of public health in the nation with a chair in minority health, GSPH is a leader in research related to women's health, HIV/AIDS and human genetics, among others. For more information about GSPH, visit the GSPH Web site at http://www.publichealth.pitt.edu.
Magee-Womens Research Institute -MWRI is a member of the Association of Independent Research Institutes, a group of 89 independent, nonprofit research institutes in the United States whose primary mission encompasses a specific research discipline. MWRI has attracted some $185 million in project grant funding focusing on the critical need for research in women's and infant's health and representing the Institute's continued strong ties to the University of Pittsburgh Schools of the Health Sciences and UPMC.
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