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. 2025 Feb 6;13(2):387.
doi: 10.3390/biomedicines13020387.

Fecal Short-Chain Fatty Acids Are Associated with Obesity in Gestational Diabetes

Katja Molan  1 , Jerneja Ambrožič Avguštin  2 , Matevž Likar  2 , Drazenka Pongrac Barlovic  3   4 , Darja Žgur Bertok  2 , Marjanca Starčič Erjavec  5   6
Affiliations

Fecal Short-Chain Fatty Acids Are Associated with Obesity in Gestational Diabetes

Katja Molan et al. Biomedicines. .

Abstract

Background: Short-chain fatty acids (SCFAs), which are produced by the microbial fermentation of undigested carbohydrates, play an important role in the metabolism and physiology of the host. SCFAs are involved in the regulation of maternal metabolism during pregnancy and influence weight gain, glucose metabolism, and metabolic hormones. Methods: In 2017, women who were treated for gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM) at the University Medical Centre Ljubljana were invited to participate in a longitudinal study. A total of 45 women were included in this study and comprehensively phenotyped. During the second and third trimester of pregnancy, the women with GDM provided fecal samples for SCFA analysis. The samples were analyzed by high-performance liquid chromatography for the simultaneous determination of acetate, propionate, and butyrate. Results: SCFA concentrations in feces differed between overweight/obese and normal-weight women with GDM. Acetate and propionate concentrations were significantly higher in pregnant women who were overweight or obese before pregnancy compared to normal-weight women but butyrate concentrations were not. Butyrate was elevated in the third trimester in the group with excessive gestational weight gain. Conclusions: The relationship between SCFAs and obesity is complex, and the association between SCFAs and GDM remains to be clarified. Regardless of the conflicting publications on the role of SCFAs, our study showed that higher acetate and propionate levels were associated with the weight categories of overweight or obesity before pregnancy and higher butyrate levels were associated with excessive gestational weight gain.

Keywords: GDM; GWG; fecal SCFA; gestational diabetes mellitus; gestational weight gain; preconception BMI; pregnancy.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflicts of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Pearson’s correlations between variables. The red color of a square indicates a positive correlation between the two variables and the blue color indicates a negative correlation. Statistically significant correlations (p ≤ 0.05) between variables are marked with an asterisk.
Figure 2
Figure 2
GWG and SCFAs in the 3rd trimester of pregnancy: (a) BMI preconceptionally and GWG. The red circles illustrate women with GDM who gained excessive weight during pregnancy; (b) SCFAs and GWG. Boxplots with 5-digit summary display (minimum, first quartile, median, third quartile, maximum). The diamonds illustrate the outliers. The asterisk indicates statistical significance at p < 0.05.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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