What does diet and weight during pregnancy mean for baby's health?

The study is a follow-up to a previous trial, called APPROACH, in which a group of overweight or obese women were asked to change their diet to limit their weight gain during pregnancy.

In this project, we follow up to see what the trial back then means for the child's growth and development now, nine years later.

Background to the survey

It is known from previous research that women who are overweight and obese before pregnancy have an increased risk of complications during pregnancy and labour and of giving birth to overweight babies. The risk is further increased if she gains a lot of weight during pregnancy.

In the original project, two groups of overweight and obese pregnant women were therefore guided to follow either a high protein or moderate protein diet.

The study showed that weight gain was lowest on average in the high protein diet group. They also had fewer caesarean sections and other complications than women who ate a moderate protein diet. It also showed that women with the least weight gain during pregnancy generally gave birth to lower birth weight babies.

Now, nine years later, the new study will examine whether the children's weight development, metabolism and other conditions are affected by the intervention.

The hypothesis is that the children, whose mothers gained less weight during pregnancy, have more optimal growth and development than the other children in the study. The same goes for children's epigenetic expression, which is thought to have fewer risk markers for adiposity (obesity), diabetes and heart disease.

Project: "APPROACH - 9-year follow-up of optimising nutrition during pregnancy to improve offspring health"