In this study, PFAS showed little association with birth outcomes. Higher PFHxS, PFOA, and PFNA concentrations were non-significantly associated with reduced birth weight. The association between PFOS and LBW seemed to be sex-specific. Finally, maternal GFR measured early during pregnancy had little influence on the estimated associations.
Background/Objectives: A higher adherence to a Mediterranean diet has been shown to be protective against obesity in adults, but the evidence is still inconclusive in children at early ages. Our objective was to explore the association between adherence to Mediterranean Diet at the age of four and the prevalence of overweight, obesity and abdominal obesity at four years of age, and incidence at the age of eight.Subjects/Methods: We analysed data from children of the INMA cohort study who attended follow-up visits at age four and eight years (n=1801 and n=1527, respectively). Diet was assessed at the age of four using a validated food frequency questionnaire. The adherence to MD was evaluated by the relative Mediterranean diet (rMED) score, and categorized as low (0-6), medium (7-10) and high (11-16).Overweight and obesity were defined according to the age-sex specific BMI cutoffs proposed by the International Obesity Task Force, and abdominal obesity as waist circumference >90 th percentile. We used Poisson regression models to estimate prevalence ratios at four years of age, and Cox regression analysis to estimate hazard ratios (HR) from four to eight years of age.
Results:In cross-sectional analyses at the age of four no association was observed between adherence to MD and overweight, obesity, or abdominal obesity. In longitudinal analyses, a high adherence to MD at age four was associated with lower incidence of overweight (HR=0.38; 95%CI: 0.21-0.67; p=0.001), obesity (HR=0.16; 95%CI: 0.05-0.53; p=0.002), and abdominal obesity (HR=0.30; 95%CI: 0.12-0.73; p=0.008) at the age of eight.
Conclusion:This study shows that a high adherence to MD at the age of four is associated with a lower risk of developing overweight, obesity, and abdominal
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