Association of whole blood n-6 fatty acids with stunting in 2-to-6-year-old Northern Ghanaian children: A cross-sectional study

Abstract

In Northern Ghana, 33% of children are stunted due to economic disparities. Dietary fatty acids (FA) are critical for growth, but whether blood FA levels are adequate in Ghanaian children is unknown. The objective of this study was to determine the association between whole blood FAs and growth parameters in Northern Ghanaian children 2–6 years of age. A drop of blood was collected on an antioxidant treated card and analyzed for FA composition. Weight and height were measured and z-scores were calculated. Relationships between FAs and growth parameters were analyzed by Spearman correlations, linear regressions, and factor analysis. Of the 307 children who participated, 29.7% were stunted and 8% were essential FA deficient (triene/tetraene ratio>0.02). Essential FA did not differ between stunted and non-stunted children and was not associated with height-for-age z-score (HAZ) or weight-for-age z-score (WAZ). In hemoglobin adjusted regression models, both HAZ and WAZ were positively associated with arachidonic acid (p≤0.01), dihomo-gamma-linolenic acid (DGLA, p≤0.05), docosatetraenoic acid (p≤0.01) and the ratio of DGLA/linoleic acid (p≤0.01). These data add to the growing body of evidence indicating n-6 FAs are critical in childhood linear growth. Our findings provide new insights into the health status of an understudied Northern Ghanaian population.

Association of Whole Blood Fatty Acids and Growth in Southern Ghanaian Children 2–6 Years of Age

“…Mean omega-3 index in the southern Ghana population is significantly higher ( p < 0.001) than what was reported in an earlier study in northern Ghana [ 34 ]. Whole blood levels of DHA and EPA are highly dependent on dietary intake.…”

“…Next, we compared the mean FA levels between our previously published data from northern Ghanaian children [ 34 ] to these data from southern Ghanaian children. Interestingly, there were highly significant differences in mean whole blood percent for most of the FAs ( p < 0.001; Table 7 ).…”

“…The use of a validated dried blood spot collection and blood transport system made the study logistically easier to conduct. This method was also successfully used in a similar study in northern Ghana [ 34 ] and in Tanzania [ 23 ]. Aside from these strengths, this study also has limitations that should be noted.…”

Interlaboratory Assessment of Dried Blood Spot Fatty Acid Compositions

“…Despite the range of methodologies used by each laboratory, including transesterification reagents, transesterification time, transesterification temperature, and GC column type and length, there was reasonably low variability for ARA, EPA, and DHA, suggesting good reproducibility of these PUFA in DBS samples. Ease of collection, storage, and analysis of DBS allows for larger clinical studies (Bisgaard et al, ; Collins et al, ; Monge et al, ) and cross‐sectional studies (Adjepong et al, ; Mashavave et al, ) to utilize DBS for determining n‐3 PUFA status, and our results allow comparison of EPA + DHA levels between such studies and ultimately populations with confidence. Because research interests of the five labs included in this study are primarily focused on PUFA, reproducibility of ARA, EPA, and DHA may be better compared to labs with greater interest in other fatty acids.…”

Sex-Dimorphic Association of Plasma Fatty Acids with Cardiovascular Fitness in Young and Middle-Aged General Adults: Subsamples from NHANES 2003–2004

“…Most of the researches concerning FAs and cardiovascular health so far have either used frequent food questionnaire to estimate the FAs levels or measured the whole non-esterified fatty acid (NEFA) levels instead of the individual FAs concentrations. Fortunately, there has been an increasing appreciation of the values of measuring circulating FAs to better translate its biomedical relevance [ 11 , 24 , 25 , 26 ].…”