Diet quality during pregnancy and its association with social factors: 3D Cohort Study (Design, Develop, Discover)

Abstract

Good diet quality during pregnancy provides adequate nutrition to support both the mothers and the fetus. The objective of this study is to describe the distribution of diet quality during pregnancy and to study the association between social factors and diet quality during pregnancy in a Canadian population. This study was based on 1535 pregnant women who provided dietary information in the 3D Cohort Study in Quebec, Canada. A 3‐day food record was used to collect dietary intake in the second trimester of pregnancy. A Canadian adaption of the Healthy Eating Index (HEI‐C) 2010 was used to quantify diet quality. Univariate and multiple linear regression models were used to calculate unadjusted and adjusted effect estimates and confidence intervals for the association between social factors and HEI‐C. The mean HEI‐C 2010 score in this study was 62.9 (SD: 11.2). Only 4.5% and 8.3% of the pregnant women consumed the recommended amounts of whole grains and ‘greens and beans’, respectively. Diet quality was lower in some subgroups of pregnant women. After multivariable adjustment, lower diet quality was observed in participants who were less educated, younger, overweight or obese before pregnancy, or parous. There was an interaction between ethnicity and immigration status on diet quality in pregnancy. These findings could be useful for health practitioners and policymakers in developing strategies to improve the diet quality of pregnant women.

The effect of diet quality on the risk of developing gestational diabetes mellitus: A systematic review and meta-analysis

“…In conclusion, although women of childbearing age and pregnant women were given varied nutritional or eating advice, there were still grounds for concern regarding the actual quality of their diet. Yu et al ( 61 ) recommended that health practitioners or policymakers should tailor strategies to the quality level of women's diets.…”

Maternal pre-pregnancy diet and prenatal depression: the mediating role of pre-pregnancy weight status and prenatal inflammation

“…Women of advanced age may have significantly higher rates of depression than younger women (52) . Moreover, older women of reproductive age have better diet quality than their younger peers in many aspects including fat and salt intake (53) , and younger age has been associated with lower prenatal diet quality (54) . Therefore, maternal age might confound the link between pre-pregnancy diet and prenatal depressive symptoms.…”

“…Socioeconomic status (SES) can confound the association between maternal diet and prenatal depressive symptoms, because low educational level and poor economic status may decrease diet quality in females (54) , and increase the risk of prenatal depression (55) . We averaged the z-scores of self-reported family annual income and maternal education and created a composite SES variable.…”

“…Parity. Parity might affect maternal diet quality (54) and the risk for developing prenatal depression (56) . We included self-reported parity as a dichotomous variable in our analyses, 0 indicating primiparity (first-time mother) and 1 indicating multiparity.…”

Food Insecurity Is Associated with Diet Quality in Pregnancy: A Cross-Sectional Study

“…While a high proportion of women agree that eating well during pregnancy is important [8,9] and report high levels of motivation to do so [10], prenatal diet quality is generally poor in Australia [10][11][12][13] and other high-income countries [14][15][16]. It does, however, follow a social gradient, with better prenatal diet quality frequently observed among those with higher educational attainment and income levels [11,[14][15][16][17][18].…”