The Association Between Major Dietary Patterns and Pregnancy-related Complications

Background: Most pregnancy-related complications are associated with increased risks of adverse outcomes for mother and her infant. Although, relations between diet and pregnancy’s complications indicate that there may be some benefits of nutritional factors to prevent such disorders, there are rare studies regarding the associations of dietary patterns and mentioned complications. So, the aim of the present study was to determine the relationship between dietary patterns and risk of pregnancy-related complications. Methods: The current prospective observational study was based on the data collected from 812 pregnant women. Dietary data was collected using a validated semi-quantitative food frequency questionnaire. Results: Three major dietary patterns identified according to the results from the factor loading matrix were: (i) ‘western dietary pattern’; (ii) ‘traditional dietary pattern’; (iii) ‘healthy dietary pattern’. Overall, this study demonstrated a marginal significant inverse association between high adherence to healthy dietary pattern and chance of having pre-eclampsia. Also, a high chance of pre-eclampsia was observed among women with the most adherence to western dietary pattern. Conclusion: We found that dietary patterns might be associated with the risk of pregnancy-related complications. Further studies are required to confirm these findings.