During pregnancy, there are certain foods that are best recommended to limit their consumption or avoid them altogether. One of them is caffeine, which they recommend limiting their consumption to 200 milligrams a day or a cup of coffee a day, as it is an amount that is considered safe for the health of mom and baby.
However, a new study suggests that even such amounts should be avoided, as it was found that consuming caffeine during pregnancy could cause the baby to be born underweight.
Published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition and conducted by researchers in Dublin, the study analyzed the effects of caffeine consumption during pregnancy on 941 mothers and their babies. According to this study, daily caffeine levels that were considered safe would not really be.
The study cites the suggestion of 200 milligrams a day of caffeine recommended by the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists and that we shared a while ago in Babies and more when we talked about coffee consumption during pregnancy.
The researchers who conducted this new study suggest that this recommendation could be wrong after observing the results obtained during their investigation, because they found that even consuming the minimum amounts could cause babies to be born underweight. In addition, it could reduce the size of the baby's head, as well as the gestational age at birth.
In Babies and more Consuming caffeine during pregnancy would increase the likelihood of children being overweightSpecifically, they found that for every 100 additional milligrams of caffeine a woman drank a day during the first trimester, there was a 2.5-ounce (approximately 70.87 grams) reduction in the baby's birth weight.
In the case of women who consumed the most caffeine in the study participants, their babies weighed an average of 6 ounces (170 grams) less than those babies who drank the least amount of caffeine.
The researchers comment that the exact cause why caffeine causes babies to be born underweight is unknown, but suggest that it could be because it restricts blood flow in the placenta.
This does not mean that drinking a cup of coffee occasionally in pregnancy hurts us, but yes we must take into account the results of the study that show the effect of caffeine on the weight of the baby, and try to reduce as much as possible the consumption of caffeine (including coffee, tea and chocolates). If we can avoid it in its entirety and change habits during pregnancy, the better.
