United States: The research shows maternal food choices during pregnancy affect the likelihood of ADHD and autism developing in her child.
A mother’s diet during pregnancy can influence her child’s risk of ADHD and autism, a new study says.
More about the news
According to researchers published in the journal Nature Metabolism, the unhealthy dietary characteristics of Western diets dramatically raise developmental disorder risks in children.
According to the lead researcher, Dr. David Horner of the University of Copenhagen in Denmark, “The greater a woman’s adherence to a Western diet in pregnancy – high in fat, sugar, and refined products while low in fish, vegetables, and fruit — the greater the risk appears to be for her child developing ADHD or autism,” US News reported.
A 66% rise in the risk of ADHD along with a 122% rise in autism development emerged from minimal Western diet consumption during pregnancy, scientists determined.
The research suggests modest changes in eating habits towards a non-Western eating pattern could decrease the potential for developmental disorders in children.
Researchers analyzed pregnancy food consumption patterns of mothers whose 10-year-old children received developmental disorder diagnoses among 500 Norwegian children.
What have the experts found?
The research team discovered that eating habits during pregnancy by mothers led to subsequent ADHD and autism diagnoses in their offspring.
The Western food pattern led to a 53% enhancement in development disorder risk, according to the study findings.
More than 60,000 Norwegian mother-child pairs were analyzed when the team conducted tests on associations between diet and developmental disorders.
Furthermore, as the senior author, Morten Arendt Rasmussen, a professor of food microbiology, gut health, and fermentation at the University of Copenhagen, stated, “We observed the strongest associations in the first and second trimesters, suggesting that brain development during this period is particularly sensitive to maternal nutritional influences,” US News reported.
Researchers confirmed the existence of dietary effects during pregnancy which create developmental risks for children.
Scientists found 43 metabolites in maternal blood that were related to Western diet patterns, which explained the relationship between dietary intake and the development of neurodevelopmental disorders.