Moving beyond quantity of participation in process evaluation of an intervention to prevent excessive pregnancy weight gain.

Background: Few lifestyle interventions have successfully prevented excessive gestational weight gain. Understanding the program processes through which successful interventions achieve outcomes is important for the design of effective programs. The objective of this study was to evaluate the effect of the quantity and quality of participation in a healthy lifestyle intervention on risk of excessive gestational weight gain.

The web of risk factors for excessive gestational weight gain in low income women.

The objective of this study is to gain an in-depth understanding of issues related to gestational weight gain (GWG) including general health, diet, and physical activity among high and low income women and to elucidate socio-ecological and psychosocial risk factors that increase risk for excessive GWG. We conducted 9 focus groups with high (n = 4 groups) and low (n = 5 groups) income pregnant women aged 18-35 years to discuss health, GWG, diet and physical activity following a discussion guide. The constant comparative method was used to code focus group notes and to identify emergent themes.

Complementary feeding messages that target cultural barriers enhance both the use of lipid-based nutrient supplements and underlying feeding practices to improve infant diets in rural Zimbabwe.

Supplementation with lipid-based nutrient supplements (LiNS) is promoted as an approach to prevent child undernutrition and growth faltering. Previous LiNS studies have not tested the effects of improving the underlying diet prior to providing LiNS. Formative research was conducted in rural Zimbabwe to develop feeding messages to improve complementary feeding with and without LiNS.

Beyond food insecurity: how context can improve complementary feeding interventions.

Background: The role of context has not been elaborated with respect to current recommendations for complementary feeding interventions, apart from a gross distinction based on food security.

Objective: Our objective was to compare two food-insecure settings in sub-Saharan Africa to determine how context (i.e.

Heat treatment of expressed breast milk is a feasible option for feeding HIV-exposed, uninfected children after 6 months of age in rural Zimbabwe.

In the context of a prevention of mother to child transmission of HIV program promoting exclusive breast-feeding (EBF) to 6 mo and offering HIV-PCR testing at approximately 6 mo, we ascertained the feasibility of expressing and heat-treating (EHT) all breast milk fed to HIV-exposed, uninfected infants following 6 mo of EBF. Twenty mother-baby pairs were enrolled from a hospital in rural Zimbabwe. Research nurses provided lactation, EHT, and complementary feeding counseling through 21 home visits conducted over an 8-wk period and collected quantitative and qualitative data on the mothers' EHT experiences, children's diets, and anthropometric measurements.

Soy- and rice-based processed complementary food increases nutrient intakes in infants and is equally acceptable with or without added milk powder.

Processed complementary foods (PCF) might mitigate several complementary feeding barriers in developing countries. Efficacy trials, however, have not shown substantial improvements in child growth, possibly due to inadequate formative research to assess acceptability and identify pitfalls. Milk powder might improve palatability of PCF but incurs a higher cost.

The effects of Ca(2+) binding on the conformation of calbindin D(28K): a nuclear magnetic resonance and microelectrospray mass spectrometry study.

Calbindin D(28K) is a six-EF-hand calcium-binding protein found in the brain, peripheral nervous system, kidney, and intestine. There is a paucity of information on the effects of calcium binding on calbindin D(28K) structure. To further examine the mechanism and structural consequences of calcium binding to calbindin D(28K) we performed detailed complementary heteronuclear NMR and microelectrospray mass spectrometry investigations of the calcium-induced conformational changes of calbindin D(28K).