To Your Health
March, 2013 (Vol. 07, Issue 03)
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Fatty Acids for Healthy Babies

Omega-3s have been known to improve health for people on many levels from heart health to vision. Now, researchers are finding that pregnant women who took daily supplements of DHA, a type of omega-3 fatty acid, had longer gestations, bigger babies and fewer early preterm births.

This is big news for women who are trying to find good supplements to take for the sake of their baby's health.

So, what did the study have to say exactly?

In the double-blinded study, published online in The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, researchers randomly assigned 154 healthy women to take 600 milligrams of DHA during the last half of pregnancy and 147 to take a placebo. They found that babies whose mothers took supplements were almost a half pound heavier than those of the mothers who took none, and they were slightly longer with larger head circumferences.

Almost 5 percent of mothers who took the placebo gave birth at 34 weeks gestation or less, compared with only 0.6 percent of the mothers who took DHA.

There were no adverse effects to taking the supplements. Talk to your doctor about whether or not it is healthy for you to be taking this supplement and if your baby can benefit from it.