Peripheral adiposity in relation to offspring birth size in women with and without gestational diabetes: preliminary...

To document the relationship between maternal body composition parameters and offspring anthropometric measurements.

A prospective sample of 48 pregnant women with either gestational diabetes (GDM, n=21) or normal glucose tolerance (NGT, n=27) was studied. Maternal weight, hip circumference and skinfold thicknesses were obtained at 32 weeks of gestation. Offspring length and weight, as well as cranial and thoracic perimeters were obtained at birth.

Reported maternal pregravid BMI correlated with offspring thoracic perimeter (ρ=0.52, P<0.05) and tended to correlate with birth weight (ρ=0.41, P=0.07). There were significant correlations between hip circumference and pregravid BMI, and with biceps, triceps, subscapular, thigh and total sum of skinfold thicknesses (ρ=0.53-0.75, all P<0.01). Hip circumference also correlated with offspring length (ρ=0.61), weight (ρ=0.75) and thoracic perimeter (ρ=0.60, all P<0.05). Maternal hip circumference was an independent and significant predictor of offspring weight, explaining 14.1% of the observed variance (P<0.05).

In a sample of women with and without GDM, maternal hip circumference was strongly related to other body composition estimates and was also predictive of offspring size measurements at birth.