Slower Growth Seen In Infants Born To Overweight Mothers

Slower Growth Seen In Infants Born To Overweight Mothers

This study bugs me because they conclude it's the obesity epidemic, rather then going to the root of the problem, which definitely has something to do with the endocrine/hormonal system! They also seem to have the study bias of blaming the fat mother! I know I am not a scientist but I can tell with this particular study they need to dig deeper.

After combing the literature for an explanation, Larson Ode and researchers at the University of Minnesota who assisted in the study think there are two reasons why babies of overweight or obese women lag initially in their physical development. The first deals with inflammation: fat cells that normally help suppress a person's immune system flare up when an adult is overweight, studies have shown. The researchers believes this state of warfare being waged in an overweight/obese pregnant mother's immune system may also inflame the fetus's developing immune system, diverting energy that otherwise would go to the baby's development.

"These (fat tissue-derived) hormones and inflammatory factors tend to have appetite/satiety regulating effects early on, and may exert their negative effects on growth both during gestation and through passage into the breast milk during postnatal development as well," says Ellen Demerath, Larson Ode's advisor at Minnesota and senior author on the paper.

The second cause has to do with how babies grow in the womb. One is through free fatty acids delivered by the mother via a growth hormone called IGF-1. The other is through a growth hormone secreted by the pituitary gland in the baby's brain. The researchers think the cosseted baby is getting so many free fatty acid-derived growth hormones from its overweight mother that the other growth generator - the pituitary gland - slows its production.

Consider what they come up with here, fat mother automatically means more fatty acids?

I have noticed on my own labs that my growth hormone has been LOW for years. Every adult has a set amount. In my case it is not severe enough to warrant meds, well as far as I know...but folks here know I talk about the interchange of the obesity epidemic and outside factors affecting hormonal and endocrine systems. If the adults are low...why wouldn't the children be?

Also why don't they ever question what came first?

The fat or the inflammation. They always assume it's the other way around....