Early Weight Gain Forecasts Accelerated Eruption of Deciduous Teeth and Later Overweight Status during the First Year

Abstract

Objectives.-To determine whether early diet and weight gain velocity have independent or interactive effects on deciduous teeth emergence and overweight status during the first year.Study design.-Monthly measures of anthropometry and teeth eruption were collected during 1-year trial (0.5-12.5 months) on formula-fed (FF) infants in which the type of randomized infant formula (cow milk or extensively hydrolyzed protein) diet significantly affected early (0.5-4.5 months) weight gain velocity. Generalized linear mixed models determined whether early diet and weight gain velocity had independent or interactive effects on timing and pattern of teeth eruption. Data from a trial on breastfed (BF) infants were used to explore effects of breast milk versus infant formula diets on teeth eruption and overweight status at 10.5 months.Results.-Independent of infant formula diet, velocities of weight gain had direct effects on the age of first deciduous tooth (P < .04) and number of erupted teeth over time (P<0.002). Greater velocity of weight gain from 0.5 to 4.5 months caused earlier and more frequent eruption of deciduous teeth from 4.5 to 12.5 months. Exploratory follow-up analyses on the BF and FF diet groups found early weight gain velocity (P=0.001), but not diet or its interaction, had significant effects. Infants in the upper quartile for weight gain velocity had more primary teeth (P=0.002), and a greater proportion of them were overweight (P<0.001) at 10.5 months.Conclusions.-Faster weight gain accretion forecasted accelerated primary teeth eruption and increased percentage of children who were overweight-risk factors for dental caries and obesity.

Effects of Early Weight Gain Velocity, Diet Quality, and Snack Food Access on Toddler Weight Status at 1.5 Years: Follow-Up of a Randomized Controlled Infant Formula Trial

“…Yet the consequence of the experimental treatment-velocities of weight gain during the first 4 months-predicted the weight status of these infants at 1.5 years. This finding extends prior report that a greater proportion of children with early rapid weight gain were overweight when 10.5 months of age, 8 months earlier than 1.5 years [36]. Unlike retrospective and prospective observational studies, which cannot elucidate causal relationships, the RCT design of the parent study and the balance between the groups for a variety of maternal and infant characteristics that are known confounders for later weight status [33][34][35] minimized selection biases and enabled us to determine the effects of infant formula diet, early weight gain velocity, and other significant covariates in predicting body weight status of toddlers, while keeping other variables constant.…”

“…As shown in Table 1, there were no significant group differences in any measured characteristics of the infants or their mothers at baseline, as was previously observed for the entire cohort [13]. Next, we established that the type of infant formula fed had significant effects on early weight gain velocity but not length gain velocity, as previously reported [13,36]. Of the 83 infants who completed the RCT at 1 year, the CMF group gained 29.2 g/day (95% CI: 27.6-30.8), and the EHF group gained 26.1 g/day (95% CI: 23.9-28.4) from 0.5 to 4.5 months (Table 2).…”

“…In this follow-up study of children who participated in a longitudinal RCT, the formula induced differences in weight gain velocity during early infancy forecasted higher body weight status and the proportion of children with overweight during the second year [36,62] that were independent of the randomized treatment. The mechanisms underlying how transient rapid weight gain during infancy increases risk for later obesity [63] is an important area for future research [18,[64][65][66].…”

The Macronutrient Composition of Infant Formula Produces Differences in Gut Microbiota Maturation That Associate with Weight Gain Velocity and Weight Status

“…As expected [ 41 , 46 ], greater velocity of weight gain predicted weight status (r = 0.59; p < 0.001) and fat mass (r = 0.45; p = 0.02) at 1 year. Children who were with overweight at 1 year tended to have lower relative abundance of Clostridia at 3–4 months (15.7 ± 5.3) compared to 1-year-olds who were a healthy weight (27.8 ± 4.2; p = 0.08).…”

“…To probe the relationships between continuous outcomes related to gut microbiota or metabolome and formula-induced differences in clinical phenotypes reported previously [ 26 , 41 ], simple and partial Pearson correlation analyses were conducted. Statistical analyses of data on gut microbiota, fecal amino acids, and bacterial genes were implemented in R (version 4.1.1) and higher [ 42 ] or Graphpad Prism (version 9.2.0; Graphpad Software Inc., San Diego, CA, USA); associations with clinical outcomes were conducted using Statistica version 14.0 (StatSoft Inc., Tulsa, OK, USA).…”