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New Study Reveals Pregnant Women Who Follow a Diet High in Sugar and Fat Could Have Children With Heart Problems
The researchers say that in a mouse study, mouse mothers who had an unhealthy diet before and during pregnancy had weakened heart offspring.
Surprisingly, these health problems lasted at least three generations, even though the youngest mice were not obese and ate a standard diet.
The team at the University of Washington School of Medicine in St. Louis says its results show how important it is for women to maintain a healthy weight both before and during pregnancy.
A new study from the Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis found that obese mothers who eat high fat and high sugar diets have children with heart problems (file image)
The researchers found that most of the children of obese mice had increased left ventricular weight, which resulted in blood flow out of the heart.
In humans, excess weight of the left ventricle is often the sign of a weak heart muscle, which can lead to heart failure.
In addition, the team found that heart problems were less obvious in the female offspring of the younger generation of mice.
"Heart abnormalities seem to dissipate a bit over generations, which is intriguing," said lead co-author Dr. Abhinav Diwan, an associate professor of medicine at the University of Washington.
"There were also differences in the hearts of men and women that we can not yet explain. In many ways, this study presents more questions than it answers, and we plan to continue to study these mice to help answer them. & # 39;
To find out if the problem involved the obese mother herself or her reproductive system, the team implanted fertilized eggs of obese mice in normal-weight mice.
However, these products had the same heart problems, which shows that the health problems came from the egg and not from environmental factors.
The team also found that these heart problems were not simply passed on to their mother's offspring.
The researchers found that male children of obese mothers, who mated to women fed a regular diet, had the same heart problems.
Changes have been specifically observed in mitochondria, tiny "powerhouses" that feed cells.
This was surprising because, at least in humans, all diseases inherited from the mother are mitochondrial disorders, according to the United Mitochondrial Disease Foundation.
Indeed, the mitochondrial DNA is only transmitted by the mother.
"We know that obesity in pregnant mothers increases the risk of heart problems for her children," said Dr. Kelle Moley, co-principal author, professor of obstetrics and gynecology at the University of Toronto. University of Washington.
"Now that we have shown that mouse fathers are also transmitting this information, we need to start studying the changes in the nucleus DNA in the egg and in the sperm to fully understand all the contributing factors.
The team believes that cardiac mitochondria problems are due to epigenetic changes in the DNA of eggs of obese mothers.
Epigenetics is the study of hereditary traits that are transported outside the genome.
They believe that these changes are then carried in the cell of any offspring, male or female.
The researchers plan to start new studies soon, but emphasize that women must adopt a healthy lifestyle before and during pregnancy.
"A big question that people might have is," What can I do if my grandmother or my great-grandmother was obese? ", Said Dr. Jeremie Ferey, first author, postdoctoral researcher at Washington University.
"We need further studies to find out if it is possible to correct these mitochondrial defects, but in general, exercise and a healthy diet are always important for heart health."
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