Assessing maternal dietary quality in early pregnancy in the programming of intrauterine fetal growth.

Introduction: It is established globally that a healthy maternal diet during pregnancy is important in programming fetal growth and development. The assessment of maternal dietary intake, however, is challenging both in clinical practice and in research studies. The aim of this study was to compare three individual dietary quality scores in early pregnancy based on European, American and World Health Organization (WHO) nutrient recommendations for the identification of suboptimal fetal growth.

Material And Methods: Women were recruited conveniently at their first antenatal hospital visit and completed a supervised 4-day diet history. The results were dichotomized into those women meeting and those not meeting macronutrient and micronutrient recommendations from the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA), WHO and the Institute of Medicine (USA). Composite nutrient scores were derived. The relation between the three individual dietary scores in early pregnancy and subsequent birthweight and small-for-gestational-age was compared using regression analyses.

Results: Of the 202 women, the mean age was 32.2 (SD 5.0) years and 44.6% were nulliparas. The mean dietary quality scores were: EFSA 9.4 (SD 3.1), WHO 8.5 (SD 3.7) and USA 9.6 (SD 3.6). On multivariable regression, there was a positive relationship between the EFSA (β = 44.7, 95% CI 17.0-72.4, P = 0.002), WHO (β = 39.2, 95% CI 17.2-61.1, P = 0.001), and USA (β = 40.0 95% CI 17.6-62.3, P = 0.001) score and birthweight. All 3 scores were positively associated with birthweight centiles. However, only those in the lowest quartile of the EFSA score were more likely to be small-for-gestational-age (odds ratio 2.8, 95% CI 1.1-7.4, P = 0.03).

Conclusions: This study found that a dietary quality score based on European nutrient recommendations was better than other international recommendations at identifying in early pregnancy those women at risk of suboptimal fetal growth.