CU nutrition doctors get $11 million Gates grant for pregnant moms

Font ResizeHealthBy Michael Booth
The Denver Postdenverpost.comPosted: 12/17/2012 03:43:58 PM MSTDecember 17, 2012 10:47 PM GMTUpdated: 12/17/2012 03:47:04 PM MST

 Two University of Colorado doctors have won an $11 million grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to further nutrition research aimed at helping babies grow even before they're conceived.

Dr. Michael Hambidge and Dr. Nancy Krebs, both with the nutrition section of the University of Colorado School of Medicine pediatrics department, will use the money to boost pregnancy nutrition in Guatemala, Pakistan, India and Zambia.

Early evidence shows intervening in undernourished societies even before women get pregnant can boost baby size and health in the long term. The researchers will look at what happens when women start taking a fortified, power-bar type square three months before they get pregnant, compared with women who don't start until their 12th week of gestation.

One big trick, of course, is to "guess" which women will be getting pregnant in 90 days. To find enough comparison subjects, local clinics and health sites have to enroll a lot of women, the researchers said.

The five-year grant can help answer vital nutritional questions in societies where many people long assumed cultures were genetically shorter or smaller than Western nations. On the contrary, research has shown that Guatemalan or other families who move to the U.S. reach the U.S. average size within a generation, Hambidge said.

"There is irreversible damage to stature potential after just two years of age" in the absence of good nutrition, Hambidge said.

"So much of the programming for later outcomes occurs in the very earliest days and weeks of gestation," Krebs said.

Michael Booth: 303-954-1686, mbooth

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