Body Weight Pregnancy weight gain linked to heavy babies
By Jimmy Downs
Nov 1, 2008 - 4:26:16 PM
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Saturday November 1, 2008 (foodconsumer.org) -- A new
study found that women gaining too much body weight during pregnancy had higher
risk of having a heavy baby and had more birth complications. Heavy babies have
higher odds of becoming overweight or obese children and adults.
The study led by researchers at the Kaiser Permanente
Center for Health Research showed women who gained more than 40 pounds during
their pregnancies were nearly twice as likely to have a heavy baby.
Teresa Hillier and colleagues followed 41,540 women who
gave birth in Washington, Oregon and Hawaii from 1995-2003 and found that of
women who gained more than 40 pounds during pregnancies, 20 percent had heavy
babies who weighed 9 or more pounds compared to less than 12 percent for those women
who gained normal weight.
Of those who both gained more than 40 pounds and suffered
gestational diabetes, 30 percent have heavy babies. Of women who gained less
than 40 pounds, but without gestational diabetes, the odds were only 13
percent.
Diabetes has been linked to higher risk of heavy babies.
"A big baby also poses serious risks for both mom
and baby at birth--for mothers, vaginal tearing, bleeding, and often
C-sections, and for the babies, stuck shoulders and broken collar bones,"
Hillier said.
The study was published in the November issue of
Obstetrics & Gynecology.