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Eating fish during pregnancy boosts baby's brain
(HealthDay News)
Updated: 2005-10-22 09:41 Women who eat fish during pregnancy may help
increase their infants' cognitive abilities, says a Harvard Medical School
study.
The finding, published in the October issue of Environmental Health
Perspectives, suggests that recent guidelines from the U.S. Food and Drug
Administration advising pregnant women to limit the amount of mercury-containing
fish they eat may have the unintended effect of depriving fetuses of essential
nutrients found in fish.
The researchers noted that while excessive mercury intake during pregnancy
can harm neurological development in fetuses, n-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids
and other nutrients in fish may play a crucial role in the neurocognitive
development of infants.
In their study, the Harvard team tested the cognitive ability of 6-month-old
infants, and compared the results to the amount of fish the infants' mothers ate
during pregnancy and the amount of mercury in the mothers' hair.
While elevated mercury levels in mothers were associated with infant
cognition deficits, the study also found that higher fish intake by mothers was
associated with higher infant cognition, especially after the researchers
adjusted for mercury levels.
Infants who scored highest on the cognitive tests had mothers who ate more
fish during pregnancy and had lower levels of hair mercury.
"The most likely explanation is that the benefit is conferred by consuming
fish types with the combination of relatively little mercury and high amounts of
beneficial nutrients," such as salmon, canned light tuna and sardines, the study
authors said.
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