News
How to get kids to eat more veggies
26 July 2013
New US research suggests that teaching young children an overarching conceptual framework for nutrition may be an effective strategy to get young children to eat more vegetables.
27 February 2013
A new study from Norway indicates that maternal use of folic acid supplements from four weeks before to eight weeks after the start of pregnancy may be associated with a lower risk of autistic disorder in children.
The observational cohort study analyzed the incidence of autism spectrum disorders (ASDs) (such as autistic disorder, Asperger’s syndrome, and pervasive developmental disorder-not otherwise specified [PDD-NOS]) among 85,176 children whose mothers used folic acid supplements from four weeks before to eight weeks after the start of pregnancy or mothers who did not supplement (1). Over the course of the study, 270 chil-dren (0.32%) were diagnosed with ASDs. The study results showed that folic acid use was associated with a decreased risk of autistic disorder. Specifically, autistic disorder was present in 0.21% of children whose mothers did not take folic acid compared with only 0.10% of children whose mothers took folic acid, which equated to a risk reduction of 39%. No association was found with Asperger’s syndrome or PDD-NOS.
The researchers commented that the new finding indicates that folic acid may – in addition to preventing neural tube defects – also offer benefits by reducing the odds of autism in children. The observation does not establish a causal relation between folic acid use and autistic disorder but provides a rationale for replicating the analyses in other study samples and further investigating genetic factors and other biological mecha-nisms that may explain the association.
26 July 2013
New US research suggests that teaching young children an overarching conceptual framework for nutrition may be an effective strategy to get young children to eat more vegetables.
4 September 2013
79% of children aged 1–3 years and 87% of those aged 4–5 years exceed the recommended upper intake level of sodium while nearly all do not consume enough potassium, reports a new US study.
23 July 2015
Pre-eclampsia is a fairly common condition in pregnant women (affecting around three million women globally per year) resulting in highly elevated blood pressure, which threatens the lives of both the mother and the unborn child. High-dose vitamin D supplementation has been shown to be effective in preventing the onset of the condition as well as ameliorating the symptoms in patients who have already presented with the condition. A new paper provides a plausible metabolic mechanism for the beneficial effect of vitamin D.