Search

Objective:To investigate the association between gestational weight gain (GWG) and total adiposity, body fat distribution, blood pressure (BP), and metabolic profile in offspring.Design:Cross-sectional study.Methods:Body mass index (BMI), waist, subscapular and tricipital skinfolds, and BP were measured and blood samples drawn in 12 775 children (aged 2-9 years) from the IDEFICS cohort. Overweight/obesity was defined by IOTF criteria. Parents filled in a questionnaire investigating child and familiar medical history and lifestyle. A section was dedicated to pregnancy history (including GWG).Results:Anthropometric indices linearly and significantly increased across GWG tertiles (BMI z-score: tertile I =0.08, 0.03-0.13; tertile II =0.16, 0.12-0.21; tertile III =0.34, 0.28-0.40, P<0.01, mean, 95% CI) by analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) adjusted by child sex, age and practice of sport, birth weight, current maternal BMI, parental education, gestational age, age at delivery, alcohol and smoking during pregnancy, maternal diabetes mellitus, gestational hypertension, and breastfeeding duration. After inclusion of BMI z-score among covariates, HbA1c significantly increased across tertiles (P=0.009) while no differences were observed for BP, serum insulin, HOMA index, blood glucose and lipids. The adjusted risk of overweight/obesity significantly increased by 14 and 22% in tertiles II and III respectively, in comparison with tertile I by logistic regression analysis controlling for covariates.Conclusion:Maternal GWG is an independent predictor of total adiposity and body fat distribution in offspring during infancy. Exposure to perinatal factors should be taken into account for early prevention of overweight and obesity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Asthma is a common, multifactorial chronic disease with a major impact on children and adolescents. Exposure to food contaminants is one of the contributing factors to asthma. This study aims to evaluate the intake and exposure of different contaminants and explore their association with childhood asthma., Methods: The Childhood Asthma and Environment Research study evaluated Italian children aged 5-14 years, divided into control and asthma case groups. Dietary habits were recorded, and exposure to 11 food contaminants was estimated with the CONT11 database. The study included 428 children, 264 with asthma and 164 without., Results: The findings of this study were consistent with those reported in other studies, indicating that exposure to nitrates and acrylamide was significantly higher in asthmatic children. The results suggest that exposure to certain contaminants could have a more pronounced effect on asthmatic children., Conclusions: The study demonstrates the importance of tools such as CONT11 in assessing food safety. Furthermore, it reinforces the need to prevent and reduce exposure to food contaminants to minimize health risks., Competing Interests: Declarations. Ethical approval: Informed consent was signed by all parents/legal guardians before the start of the study. The study received ethical approval from the local Institutional Ethics Committee (protocol number: 08/2014) and registered on ClinicalTrials.gov system (ID: NCT02433275). Data were processed as specified in the European Union General Data Protection Regulation (EU 2016/679; GDPR), and the Declaration of Helsinki on research ethics was followed. Conflict of interest: No financial or non-financial benefits have been received or will be received from any party related directly or indirectly to the subject of this article. The authors have no conflict of interest to declare., (© 2024. Children's Hospital, Zhejiang University School of Medicine.)

Objective: To investigate the reliability of parental recall of birth weight, birth length and gestational age several years after birth., Methods: Parentally recalled birth parameters were obtained from the European multicentric cohort study IDEFICS (Identification and prevention of dietary- and lifestyle-induced health effects in children and infants) and compared to the corresponding data externally recorded in the child's medical check-up booklet. The agreement between the two sources was examined using Bland-Altman plots, intraclass correlation coefficients and Cohen's kappa for clinically relevant categories. Additionally, logistic regression models were used to identify factors related to parental recall accuracy., Results: A total of 4930 children aged 2 to 11 years were included. Accuracy of birth weight within 100 g was 88%, 94% of the recalled birth length was within 2 cm, and 99% of the parents could recall with 2 weeks accuracy how many weeks their child was delivered preterm. Discrepancies of more than two weeks or more than 100 g were more likely in parents of low or medium socioeconomic status. Non-biological parents were 3.4 times more likely to have a discrepancy of more than 100 g compared to biological mothers (95% CI 1.7-6.7). Moreover, parents were less likely to accurately recall their child's birth parameters with increasing number of children within a family., Conclusions for Practice: In general, parents' information matched well with the medical check-up booklet. However, accuracy varied among different groups which should be taken into consideration when using birth data recalled by parents in studies of child health., Competing Interests: Declarations Conflict of interest The authors declare that they have no competing interests. Ethical Approval The study has been approved by the appropriate institutional review boards of all eight study centers (1. Belgium: Ethics Committee of the Gent University Hospital, 15/10/2007, ref: No. EC UZG 2007/243 and 19/02/2013, No. B670201316342; 2. Cyprus: Cyprus National Bioethics Committee, 12/07/2007, ref: No. EEBK/EM/2007/16 and 21/Feb/2013, No. EEBK/ETI/2012/33; 3. Estonia: Tallinn Medical Research Ethics Committee (TMREC), 14/06/2007, ref: No. 1093 and 17/January 2013, No. 128; 4. Germany: Ethic Commission of the University of Bremen, 16/01/2007 and 11/12/2012; 5. Hungary: Medical Research Council, 21/Jun/2007, ref: 22–156/2007-1018EKU and 18/12/2012, 4536/2013/EKU; 6. Italy: Ethics Committee of the Local Health Authority (ASL) in Avellino, 19/06/2007, ref: No. 2/CE and 18/Sep/2012, No. 12/12; 7. Spain: Ethics Committee for Clinical Research of Aragon (CEICA), 20/06/2007, ref: No. PI07/13 and 13/Feb/2013, No. PI13/0012; 8. Sweden: Regional Ethics Research Board in Gothenburg, 30/07/2007, ref: No. 264–07 and 10/Jan/2013, No. 927–12). The study has been performed in accordance with the ethical standards as laid down in the 1964 Declaration of Helsinki and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards. Consent to Participate Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study. Before children entered the study, parents provided written informed consent. Additionally, children gave oral consent for examinations and sample collection. Consent for Publication Not applicable., (© 2024. The Author(s).)

Advanced glycation end products (AGEs) have been implicated in chronic diseases in adults, but their role in paediatric populations remains uncertain. This study, conducted on the Italian sample of the I.Family project, aimed to investigate the relationship between dietary and urinary fluorescent AGEs in children and adolescents. The secondary objective was to investigate the sources of dietary AGEs (dAGEs) and their association with dietary composition and anthropometric parameters. Dietary data were collected from 1048 participants via 24 h dietary recall in 2013/2014 to estimate dAGEs intake, while urinary fluorescent AGE levels were measured in 544 individuals. Participants were stratified based on dAGEs intake and compared with respect to urinary fluorescent AGE levels, anthropometric measurements, and dietary intake. The results showed no significant correlation between dietary and urinary fluorescent AGE levels, nor between dAGEs and anthropometric parameters. Notably, higher dAGEs were associated with a diet richer in protein (especially from meat sources) and fat and lower in carbohydrates. In addition, the consumption of ultra-processed foods was lower in participants with a higher DAGE intake. This study highlights the lack of a clear association between dietary and urinary fluorescent AGEs in children, but suggests a distinctive dietary pattern associated with increased dAGEs intake. Further investigation is warranted to elucidate the potential health implications of dAGEs in paediatric populations.

Dietary diversity (DD) plays a crucial role in fostering high-quality diets, but its association with health outcomes, particularly body adiposity and non-communicable diseases (NCDs), is inconsistent. This may be due to a lack of a standardized method for estimating DD. Our study investigates the association between two DD indices, namely the dietary diversity score (DDS) and food variety score (FVS), and anthropometric measures, biochemical parameters, and diet quality in a large population sample from the I.Family study across research centers in eight European countries. In our cross-sectional analysis of 3035 participants, DDSs varied among countries, with a higher prevalence in the third DDS tertile among those with higher education. DDS showed a positive association with diet quality across all age groups. Higher DDS tertile individuals showed increased fiber, fruit, and vegetable intake, greater meal frequency, and lower ultra-processed food consumption. No relevant biochemical differences were observed across DDS tertiles, and a higher DDS was associated with lower overweight/obesity prevalence only in adults. No significant associations were found with FVS. Our findings emphasize the need to consider food groups for a more accurate estimation of diet quality. This aligns with studies suggesting DDS alone is not an independent risk factor for obesity in children and adolescents. Public health programs should prioritize food diversity to promote improved nutrition and overall well-being in communities.

Unhealthy diets represent a major risk for the pathogenesis of metabolic and chronic inflammatory diseases. Improving the quality of diet is important to prevent chronic diseases, and diet-induced modifications of the gut microbiota (GM) community likely play an important role. The EU-funded Stance4Health project aims at performing a randomized clinical trial based on a nutritional intervention program in the context of normal weight and overweight adults as well as children with obesity and gluten-related disorders or allergy/intolerance to cow's milk. The trial will evaluate the efficacy of a Smart Personalised Nutrition (SPN) service in modifying GM composition and metabolic function and improving consumer empowerment through technology adoption.

Pasta represents a staple food in many populations and, in recent years, an increasing number of pasta items has been placed on the market to satisfy needs and trends. The aims of this work were: (i) to investigate the nutritional composition of the different types of pasta currently sold in Italy by collecting the nutrition facts on their packaging; (ii) to compare energy, nutrient and salt content per 100 g and serving in fresh and dried pasta; (iii) to compare the nutrition declaration in pairs of products with and without different declarations (i.e., gluten free (GF), organic, and nutrition claims (NC)). A total of 756 items, made available by 13 retailers present on the Italian market, were included in the analysis. Data showed a wide difference between dried and fresh pasta, with high inter-type variability. A negligible amount of salt was observed in all types of pasta, except for stuffed products, which had a median high quantity of salt (>1 g/100 g and ~1.5 g/serving). Organic pasta had higher fibre and lower protein contents compared to conventional pasta. GF products were higher in carbohydrate and fat but lower in fibre and protein than not-GF products, while only a higher fibre content was found in pasta with NC compared to products not boasting claims. Overall, the results show high variability in terms of nutrition composition among the pasta items currently on the market, supporting the importance of reading and understanding food labels for making informed food choices.

Plant-based drinks represent a heterogeneous class of beverages, made from several vegetal sources, with a market rapidly expanding around the world. These beverages are mainly drunk in the replacement of milk. Thus, aims of the present study were to: (i) evaluate the nutritional declaration of 330 plant-based drinks currently available on the Italian market; (ii) compare their nutrition facts based on type, presence or not of organic certification and nutrition (NC) or health claims (HC), and of specific claims ("no added sugars" and "source of calcium"); (iii) compare their nutrition composition with cow's milk. A high variability in terms of nutrient profile among products was observed. Limited difference was found between products belonging to both organic and NC categories, while products carrying HC showed lower energy, carbohydrates, sugar, and higher protein contents than the related counterparts. Compared to cow's milk, plant-based drinks showed differences in terms of nutrient profile, mostly regarding the lower protein content (except for soy drinks). Overall, due to the variability, findings from the present survey show that plant-based drinks sold in Italy cannot be considered tout court as milk substitutes and support the importance of improving knowledge towards food labeling to make conscious food choices.

Sugar, particularly as free sugars or sugar-sweetened beverages, significantly contributes to total energy intake, and, possibly, to increased body weight. Excessive consumption may be considered as a proxy of poor diet quality. However, no previous studies evaluated the association between the habit of adding sugars to "healthy" foods, such as plain milk and fresh fruit, and indicators of adiposity and/or dietary quality in children. To answer to these research questions, we Panalysed the European cohort of children participating in the IDEFICS study. Anthropometric variables, frequency of consumption of sugars added to milk and fruit (SAMF), and scores of adherence to healthy dietary pattern (HDAS) were assessed at baseline in 9829 children stratified according to age and sex. From this cohort, 6929 children were investigated again after two years follow-up. At baseline, a direct association between SAMF categories and adiposity indexes was observed only in children aged 6⁻<10 years, while the lower frequency of SAMF consumption was significantly associated with a higher HDAS. At the two year follow-up, children with higher baseline SAMF consumption showed significantly higher increases in all the anthropometric variables measured, with the exception of girls 6⁻<10 years old. The inverse association between SAMF categories and HDAS was still present at the two years follow-up in all age and sex groups. Our results suggest that the habit to adding sugars to foods that are commonly perceived as healthy may impact the adherence to healthy dietary guidelines and increase in adiposity risk as well.

We describe the case of a 56-year-old man who had high aminotransferase levels and anti-hepatitis C virus (HCV) antibodies. He underwent liver biopsy and biochemical screening to evaluate whether he would benefit from interferon (IFN) treatment. The patient was discharged with a diagnosis of HCV-related active chronic hepatitis, skin porphyria, and type 2 diabetes. On December 5, 1995, he began therapy with recombinant IFN-alpha at a dose of 3 MIU three times a week. He stopped this therapy in February 1996 because of asthenia, diplopia, headache, and anxiety. During IFN therapy, he had normal aminotransferase levels and no detectable HCV RNA, a condition that persists to the present. Between March and May 1996, the patient was admitted several times to a neurology clinic, where myasthenia gravis was diagnosed and treatment with pyridostigmine and cyclosporine was initiated. This case and others indicate that caution should be exercised in administering IFN because low doses can be correlated with myasthenia gravis in patients without malignancies.