Healthy diet may help ward off hypertensive disorders of pregnancy

Women who follow a healthier diet with higher amount of non-starchy vegetables and fruits are less likely to develop hypertensive disorders of pregnancy, according to data from the MADRES* cohort, which comprises predominantly Hispanic/Latina low-income participants.

“Conversely a diet with relatively higher intakes of solid fat, refined grains and cheese may increase the likelihood of a diagnosis of pre-eclampsia,” said lead author Dr Luis Maldonado from the Keck School of Medicine at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles, California, US, who presented the findings at the EPI Lifestyle 2022 Congress.

“These results suggest that dietary counselling may be particularly important for pregnant women from high-risk populations,” he added.

The ongoing, prospective cohort study included 464 pregnant women (mean age 29 years) who were participants of MADRES. All women verbally completed up to two dietary recalls of foods and beverages consumed within the past 24-hour period during the third trimester of pregnancy, using the Automated Self-Administered 24-Hour Dietary Assessment Tool (ASA24). [EPI Lifestyle 2022, abstract 21]  

Overall, 21.6 percent of the participants developed ≥1 hypertensive disorder of pregnancy — including 6.7 percent who had gestational hypertension and 12.1 percent cases of pre-eclampsia.

When analysing by the SRC dietary pattern (diet consisting of the most solid fats, cheese, and refined grains), women in the upper quartile of consumption were 3.5 times more likely to develop any hypertensive disorder of pregnancy (odds ratio [OR], 3.50; p-trend=0.010) and 3.59 times more likely to be diagnosed with pre-eclampsia compared with women in the lowest consumption quartile (OR, 3.59; p-trend=0.058).

On the other hand, women in the upper quartile of the VOF dietary pattern (which comprised mostly non-starchy vegetables, oils and fruits) had significantly lower risk of developing pre-eclampsia (OR, 0.33; p-trend=0.031).

As the data came from predominantly low-income Hispanic/Latina participants, the researchers acknowledged that the findings might not be generalizable to other populations. Moreover, the self-reported nature of dietary data also constitutes a limitation.

“Additionally, the women’s diets were assessed only at one point in time, and mostly in the third trimester of pregnancy, which may have been either before or after a hypertensive disorder of pregnancy was diagnosed,” Maldonado noted.

“The timing is important because individuals may change their diet and other health behaviours as a result of any other serious health-related diagnosis such as gestational diabetes or high blood pressure. Therefore, future studies that capture diet earlier in pregnancy and before a hypertensive disorder of pregnancy diagnosis is made are needed to verify our findings,” he added.

*MADRES: Maternal and Developmental Risks from Environmental and Social Stressors