Associations of dietary patterns and pre-eclampsia: a matched case-control study

Little is known about the effects of dietary patterns on prevalent pre-eclampsia in Chinese population. This study aimed to investigate the associations between dietary patterns and the odds of pre-eclampsia among Chinese pregnant women. A 1:1 age- and gestational week-matched case-control study was conducted between March 2016 and February 2019. A total of 440 pairs of pre-eclampsia cases and healthy controls were included. Dietary intakes were assessed by a seventy-nine-item FFQ and subsequently grouped into twenty-eight distinct groups. Factor analysis using the principal component method was adopted to derive the dietary patterns. Conditional logistic regression was used to analyse the associations of dietary patterns with prevalent pre-eclampsia. We identified four distinct dietary patterns: high fruit-vegetable, high protein, high fat-grain and high salt-sugar. We found that high fruit-vegetable dietary pattern (quartile (Q)4 v. Q1, OR 0 center dot 71, 95 % CI 0 center dot 55, 0 center dot 92, P-trend = 0 center dot 013) and high protein dietary pattern (Q4 v. Q1, OR 0 center dot 72, 95 % CI 0 center dot 54, 0 center dot 95, P-trend = 0 center dot 011) were associated with a decreased odds of pre-eclampsia in Chinese pregnant women. Whereas high fat-grain dietary pattern showed a U-shaped association with pre-eclampsia, the lowest OR was observed in the third quartile (Q3 v. Q1, OR 0 center dot 75, 95 % CI 0 center dot 57, 0 center dot 98, P-trend = 0 center dot 111). No significant association was observed for high salt-sugar dietary pattern. In conclusion, pregnancy dietary pattern characterised by high fruit-vegetable or high protein was found to be associated with a reduced odds of pre-eclampsia in Chinese pregnant women.

Automated summary

This study investigates the associations between dietary patterns and the odds of pre-eclampsia among Chinese pregnant women. The findings suggest that high fruit-vegetable and high protein dietary patterns are associated with a reduced risk of pre-eclampsia in this population.