Saturday, March 29, 2008
Drug Interactions
Calcium Supplementation During Pregnancy May Increase Bone Mass in Newborns
By Greg Arnold, DC, CSCS, September 12, 2006, abstracted from "Effects of Dietary Calcium Intervention on Adolescent Mothers and Newborns: A Randomized Controlled Trial" in the September 2006 issue of Obstetrics and Gynecology.
Pregnancy can be "a remarkable and challenging time" for any woman. But pregnancy is even more challenging for teenage women because of the stress placed on the need for calcium (Ca) for both her growing baby and her own maturing skeleton. Therefore, calcium intake needs to be highest during teenage pregnancy and current recommendations stand at 1,300 mg per day.
So in addition to increasing intakes of vitamin C, vitamin E, and B-vitamins to help ensure a healthy pregnancy, a new study has found that ensuring high calcium intake, either through food or supplementation, may increase bone density in newborns.
In the study, 72 pregnant adolescent mothers received either orange juice fortified with calcium, dairy, or control for 15 months (starting 20 weeks before pregnancy) so that their daily calcium intake was at least 1,200 mg per day. Those unable to attain this through food were given calcium supplements. In addition to recording maternal and infant weight, length, and blood pressure (BP), maternal dietary records were evaluated and blood was drawn for blood calcium levels, phosphate, magnesium, and vitamin D. Finally, umbilical cord blood was collected for fetal blood levels of vitamin D and Calcium.
At the end of the study, the researchers found that mothers in the orange juice plus calcium and dairy groups had higher calcium intake (1,472 mg and 1,771 mg) than the control group (862 mg). Half of the mothers in the orange juice plus calcium group required Calcium supplements.
Mothers in the dairy group had higher intakes of phosphate, vitamin D, magnesium, higher blood levels of folic acid and vitamin D, and higher umbilical cord vitamin D levels. Mothers in the orange juice plus calcium group had higher blood levels of phosphate but lower folic acid and vitamin D. Finally, infants in the dairy group were as much as 20% heavier than infants in both the control and orange juice plus calcium groups while also having higher total body calcium than the control group.
For the researchers, "Calcium diet supplemented with dairy products during adolescent pregnancy resulted in higher maternal vitamin D and folate serum levels and higher newborn weight and bone mineralization compared with controls."