Category: Nutrition

Is mismatch between poor fetal growth and rapid postnatal weight gain a pertinent health issue in contemporary well-nourished populations?

Yi Ying Ong, Yung Seng Lee and Navin Michael

Fetal undernutrition followed by abundant food after birth might be a recipe for disaster — it is linked to increased risk of obesity and cardiometabolic diseases later in life. The Dutch famine birth cohort study is a tragic “natural experiment” that exemplified this phenomenon. It observed that people born to mothers who experienced a transient period of severe famine during pregnancy, followed by a return to normal diet postnatally, had an increased risk of obesity and cardiometabolic diseases.

This mismatch between a poor fetal nutritional environment and a rich postnatal nutritional environment might cause fetal adaptive responses to become maladaptive, leading to greater cardiometabolic risk in adulthood. This is known as the developmental mismatch hypothesis.

However, is developmental mismatch still a pertinent health issue affecting cardiometabolic risk in contemporary well-nourished populations, who are not facing famine or drastic environmental stresses? In these populations, fetal undernutrition is more likely to result from uteroplacental insufficiency than maternal malnutrition.

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Junk food in childhood contributes to socioeconomic inequalities in overweight and obesity

Alexandra_Chung_imageAlexandra Chung

Childhood overweight and obesity are a global public health problem. In high-income countries, obesity follows socioeconomic patterns, in that people with a lower socioeconomic position are more likely to be overweight or obese than those with a higher socioeconomic position. Poor diet is a key risk factor for excess weight gain. It is also a risk factor that we can do something about.

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Personalised nutrition is better than a “one size fits all” approach in improving diets

Mathers & Celis-MoralesJohn C Mathers and Carlos Celis-Morales

Good dietary patterns are associated with improved health and well-being but many people find it difficult to change their eating habits. In this study we tested the idea that a “personalised nutrition” approach would be better in helping people improve their diets.

Why diet matters
Poor dietary patterns lead to poor health and increased risk of obesity and a wide range of common diseases including cardiovascular disease, several cancers and type 2 diabetes. Despite knowing that we should improve our diets by eating more vegetables and fruit, cutting down on fatty foods and going easy on sugary drinks and confectionary, many people find it difficult to make sustained improvements in their dietary choices. Knowing what we should do is not enough. We need interventions which help us to make, and to keep on making, appropriate changes in what we eat.

Continue reading “Personalised nutrition is better than a “one size fits all” approach in improving diets” →