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. 2015 Jul:98:1-6.
doi: 10.1016/j.plefa.2015.04.001. Epub 2015 Apr 17.

Long chain polyunsaturated fatty acid supplementation in infancy increases length- and weight-for-age but not BMI to 6 years when controlling for effects of maternal smoking

L M Currie  1 , E A Tolley  2 , J M Thodosoff  1 , E H Kerling  1 , D K Sullivan  1 , J Colombo  3 , S E Carlson  4
Affiliations

Long chain polyunsaturated fatty acid supplementation in infancy increases length- and weight-for-age but not BMI to 6 years when controlling for effects of maternal smoking

L M Currie et al. Prostaglandins Leukot Essent Fatty Acids. 2015 Jul.

Abstract

Long chain polyunsaturated fatty acids (LCPUFA) are added to infant formula but their effect on long-term growth of children is under studied. We evaluated the effects of feeding LCPUFA-supplemented formula (n = 54) compared to control formula (n = 15) throughout infancy on growth from birth-6 years. Growth was described using separate models developed with the MIXED procedure of SAS(®) that included maternal smoking history and gender. Compared to children fed control formula, children who consumed LCPUFA supplemented formula had higher length-/stature-/and weight-for-age percentiles but not body mass index (BMI) percentile from birth to 6 years. Maternal smoking predicted lower stature (2-6 years), higher weight-for-length (birth-18 months) and BMI percentile (2-6 years) independent of LCPUFA effects. Gender interacted with the effect of LCPUFA on stature, and the relationship between smoking and BMI, with a larger effect for boys. Energy intake did not explain growth differences. A relatively small control sample is a limitation.

Keywords: BMI; Child; DHA; Growth; Infant; LCPUFA.

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Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Participant flow in the primary and follow-up studies. Children who enrolled for followup were included in the present study, but their anthropometric data from birth to 6 years was included in the analysis.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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