Births with low vitamin D weighted less (Hispanic too)

Created December 2015

Early pregnancy vitamin D status and risk for adverse maternal and infant outcomes in a bi-ethnic cohort: the Behaviors Affecting Baby and You (B.A.B.Y.) Study.

Br J Nutr. 2015 Dec;114(12):2116-28. doi: 10.1017/S0007114515003980. Epub 2015 Oct 28.

Nobles CJ1, Markenson G2, Chasan-Taber L1.

1 Department of Biostatistics and Epidemiology,School of Public Health & Health Sciences,Division of Biostatistics & Epidemiology,University of Massachusetts, Amherst,MA 01003-9304,USA.

2 Baystate Medical Center,Division of Maternal-Fetal Medicine,Springfield,MA 01199,USA.

Reduced Birth Weight | | | | | --- | --- | --- | | < 20 ng | < 30 ng | > 30 ng | | 140 grams | 176 grams | Reference (0 grams) | Note: The conclusions appears to be for ALL women, not just Hispanic women See also VitaminDWiki * Low vitamin D increased probability of low birth weight by 60 percent – meta-analysis June 2012 * [ **7Xmore likely to have low birth weight babies when mother very low on vitamin D – March 2010](/pages/7x-more-likely-to-have-low-birth-weight-babies-when-mother-very-low-on-vitamin-d/) * Low birth weight associated with vitamin D levels less than 11 ng – Nov 2012 * Opening windows while pregnant cut the number of low birth weight infants by half – Feb 2013 * Small for gestational age birth was 6.5X more likely if mother was vitamin D deficient – March 2015 * 12X * more likely to have low birth weight if low vitamin D Pregnancy category starts with {include}

Vitamin D deficiency is common during pregnancy and higher in Hispanic as compared with non-Hispanic white women. However, the association between vitamin D deficiency and adverse pregnancy outcomes remains unclear and may vary across ethnic groups, in part because of genetic variation in the metabolism of vitamin D. Few studies have included Hispanic women. Therefore, we investigated this association among 237 participants in the Behaviors Affecting Baby and You Study, a randomised trial of an exercise intervention among ethnically diverse prenatal care patients in Massachusetts. Baseline serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D (25(OH)D) was measured at 15·2 (sd 4·7) weeks' gestation. Information on adverse pregnancy outcomes was abstracted from medical records. Mean 25(OH)D was 30·4 (sd 12·0) ng/ml; 53·2 % of participants had insufficient (<30 ng/ml) and 20·7 % had deficient (<20 ng/ml) 25(OH)D levels.

After adjusting for

  • month of blood draw,

  • gestational age at blood draw,

  • gestational age at delivery,

  • age,

  • BMI and

  • Hispanic ethnicity,

women with insufficient and deficient vitamin D had infants with birth weights 139·74 (se 69·16) g (P=0·045) and 175·52 (se 89·45) g (P=0·051) lower compared with women with sufficient vitamin D levels (≥30 ng/ml).

Each 1 ng/ml increase in 25(OH)D was associated with an increased risk for gestational diabetes mellitus among Hispanic women only (relative risk 1·07; 95 % CI 1·03, 1·11) in multivariable analysis.

We did not observe statistically significant associations between maternal vitamin D status and other pregnancy outcomes. Our findings provide further support for an adverse impact of vitamin D deficiency on birth weight in Hispanic women.

PMID: 26507186

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Tags: Infant-Child