Vitamin D is very important during pregnancy, and a new research by the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health found that vitamin D deficiency while pregnant could increase the chance of children developing multiple sclerosis (MS) in later life.
Multiple sclerosis is a condition that can affect your brain, spinal cord, and the optic nerves in your eyes.
To conduct the study, the researchers looked at 193 individuals — 163 of them female. They had all been diagnosed with MS and had mothers who had taken part in the Finnish Maternity Cohort — a nationwide biorepository that has collected and stored prenatal serum samples since 1983 in order to study and maintain the populations’ health and prevent disease.
The team looked at the blood samples taken from the participant’s mothers during pregnancy, 70 percent of which had been collected during the first trimester. The samples were tested for serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D (25[OH]D) levels — the test used to determine an individual’s vitamin D levels.
A level of 20 nanograms/milliliter to 50 ng/mL is considered optimal, while between 10 ng/mL and 19 ng/mL indicates a mild to moderate deficiency. Levels at less than 12.02 ng/mL are considered insufficient.
After comparing the results to a control group, the team found that the children of mothers who were vitamin D deficient during pregnancy had a 90 percent higher chance of developing MS in adulthood compared with children of mothers who were not vitamin D deficient.
“Our results suggest that vitamin D deficiency during pregnancy increases MS risk in the offspring,” concluded researchers. They say that correcting this deficiency early in pregnancy could have a beneficial effect.
This only goes on to show how important vitamin D actually is during pregnancy. Vitamin D can be gotten from cheese, beef, egg yolks, mushrooms, fatty fish. fish oils and sunlight. Dairy products like milk and yoghurt are also rich in vitamin D.
S.O.Z