Dietary intake and physical activity in women and offspring after pregnancies complicated by preeclampsia or diabetes mellitus

Women with a history of diabetes mellitus (DM) or preeclampsia (PE) in pregnancy run an increased risk of future cardiovascular associated diseases. Offspring of such pregnancies may possibly also have an altered risk in health status. Descriptive studies of dietary intake and physical activity in mother and children several years after pregnancies complicated by PE or DM are lacking. By the use of a simple questionnaire survey, we aimed at exploring whether there are any differences in these lifestyle factors between women and between offspring 5-8 years after PE (23 women-child pairs) or DM (23 women-child pairs) in pregnancy, compared to uncomplicated pregnancies (controls, 17 women-child pairs). Our data showed that women in the DM- and PE-group were less physically active compared to controls (p < 0.01 and p < 0.05, respectively), and more children in the control-group followed the Norwegian fruit recommendations compared to children in the DM- group (p < 0.01).