Abstract
Not only healthy growth but also childhood obesity partly originate from early life. The current work aimed to examine the association of feeding practices during infancy with growth and adiposity indices in preschool children from four European countries and in UK schoolchildren and adolescents. Existing data from four European birth cohorts (ALSPAC-UK, EDEN-France, EuroPrevall-Greece and Generation XXI-Portugal) were used. Anthropometrics and body composition indices were collected. Parallel multivariate regression analyses were performed to examine the research hypothesis. Overall, the analyses showed that breastfeeding and timing of complementary feeding were not consistently associated with height z-score, overweight/obesity, and body fat mass in children or adolescents. However, breastfeeding duration for less than 6 months was associated with lower height z-scores in 5-year-old French children (P < 0.001) but with higher height z-scores in 4-year-old UK children (P = 0.006). Furthermore, introduction of complementary foods earlier than 4 months of age was positively associated with fat mass levels in 5-year-old French children (P = 0.026).
Conclusion: Early feeding practices, i.e., any breastfeeding duration and age of introduction of complementary foods, do not appear to be consistently associated with height z-score, overweight/obesity, and body fat mass in preschool children from four European countries and in UK schoolchildren and adolescents.
What is known? |
• Healthy growth and childhood obesity partly originate from early life. |
What is new? |
• Breastfeeding duration less than 6 months was associated with lower height z-scores in 5-year-old French children, while the opposite was observed in 4-year-old British children. |
• Introduction of complementary foods earlier than 4 months was positively associated with fat mass levels in 5-year-old French children, but not in the other three countries. |
• Early feeding practices did not appear to be consistently associated with growth and adiposity indices, and as such, no clear influence can be observed. |
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Abbreviations
- ALSPAC:
-
Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children
- BIA:
-
Bioelectrical impedance analysis
- BMI:
-
Body mass index
- CI:
-
Confidence interval
- DXA:
-
Dual energy X-ray absorptiometry
- EDEN:
-
Etude des Déterminants pré et post natals de la santé et du développement de l’ENfant
- FFQ:
-
Food-frequency questionnaire
- HPVS:
-
Healthy Plate Variety Score
- SD:
-
Standard deviation
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Acknowledgements
We are grateful to Sylvie Issanchou for her coordination of the HabEat project. We are indebted to all participants for providing the data used in the four birth cohorts, as well as to all members of the research team and coordinators (Nikos Papadopoulos from EuroPrevall, Henrique Barros from Generation XXI, George Davey Smith from ALSPAC, and Barbara Heude from the EDEN mother-child Study Group).
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Study concept and design: GM, BLG, LJ, AO, PM, CL, PE, MAC, YM. Acquisition of data: GM, BLG, LJ, AO, LD, PM, CL, PE, MAC, YM. Analysis and interpretation of data: GM, BLG, LJ, AO, CPL, PM, CL, PE, MAC, YM. Drafting of the manuscript: GM. Critical revision of the manuscript for important intellectual content: GM, BLG, LJ, AO, SL, PM, CL, PE, MAC, YM. Final approval of the version to be published: All authors.
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Ethical approval
This study was conducted according to the guidelines laid down in the Declaration of Helsinki, and all procedures involving human subjects were approved by each institute’s ethics committee.
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Written informed consent was obtained for all subjects included in the study.
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None of the authors has any potential conflict of interest to declare.
Source of funding
The research leading to these results has received funding from the European Community’s Seventh Framework Program (FP7/2007–2013) under the grant agreement no. FP7–245012-HabEat. ALSPAC was funded by the UK Medical Research Council, the Wellcome Trust and the University of Bristol provided core support for ALSPAC. The EuroPrevall study was funded by the EU through FP6-FOOD-CT-2005-514000. Generation XXI was funded by Programa Operacional de Saúde – Saúde XXI, Quadro Comunitário de Apoio III, and by Administração Regional de Saúde Norte. For follow-up assessments, Generation XXI received funding from Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia, co-funded by FEDER through COMPETE and from Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian. Support for the EDEN study (Étude des Déterminants pré- et postnatals précoces du développement et de la santé de l’ENfant) was provided by the following organizations: Fondation pour la Recherche Médicale, French Ministry of Research Institut Fédératif de Recherche and Cohort Program, INSERM Nutrition Research Program, French Ministry of Health Perinatal Program, French Agency for Environment Security (AFFSET), French National Institute for Population Health Surveillance (INVS), Paris-Sud University, French National Institute for Health Education (INPES), Nestlé, Mutuelle Générale de l’Éducation Nationale, French Speaking Association for the Study of Diabetes and Metabolism (Alfediam), National Agency for Research (ANR nonthematic program), and National Institute for Research in Public Health (IRESP TGIR Cohorte Santé 2008 Program). The study sponsors were not involved in the study design, data collection, or data analyses.
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Moschonis, G., de Lauzon-Guillain, B., Jones, L. et al. The effect of early feeding practices on growth indices and obesity at preschool children from four European countries and UK schoolchildren and adolescents. Eur J Pediatr 176, 1181–1192 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00431-017-2961-5
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00431-017-2961-5