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Iodine Deficiency as Assessed by Neonatal TSH in a Sample of Mother-and-Newborn Pairs in Jiangsu Province, China

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Abstract

China has eliminated iodine deficiency disorders since 2011 via the implementation of universal salt iodisation. Following this, a new revised salt iodisation policy was introduced to reduce iodine content in table salt. Since maternal iodine deficiency can lead to cognitive impairment and cretinism in infants, the aim of our study was to assess if the iodine status of pregnant women and neonates was affected by the introduction of new salt iodisation policy. The medical records of the pregnant women and their neonates in the Northern Jiangsu People’s Hospital, Yangzhou, Jiangsu Province, China, between January 2018 and May 2018 were reviewed and obtained. Our study included 374 mother-and-newborn pairs. Mean age of the participants was 28 ± 4 years. TSH, FT3 and FT4 of the participants remained within the reference range. The prevalence of thyroid dysfunction was 4.3%. The overall mean neonatal TSH, birth weight and prevalence of low birth weight (LBW) was 2.56 ± 1.59 mIU/L, 3348 ± 465 g and 2.4%, respectively. The prevalence of neonatal TSH values > 5 mIU/L was 8.3%, which suggested the emergence of mild iodine deficiency (i.e. 3.0–19.9%) in our province. In conclusion, although our study reported an improvement of iodine status to mild iodine deficiency in 2017, our pregnant women remained to be iodine deficient. We recommended an ongoing monitoring of iodine status and advocate for the routine iodine supplementation together with iodised salt in Chinese pregnant women.

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Acknowledgements

We express our sincere thanks to all the participants in our study.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Clinical Medical College, Yangzhou University, Yangzhou, 225009, Jiangsu Province, China

    Hang Zhou, Yiming Lu & Qihua Zhao

  2. Department of Clinical Nutrition, Northern Jiangsu People’s Hospital, Yangzhou, 225001, Jiangsu Province, China

    Hang Zhou & Qihua Zhao

  3. Department of Orthopedics, Northern Jiangsu People’s Hospital, Yangzhou, 225001, Jiangsu Province, China

    Yiming Lu

  4. Department of Clinical Nutrition, Suzhou Ninth People’s Hospital, Suzhou, 215200, Jiangsu Province, China

    Binyu Pan

  5. Department of Health and Environmental Sciences, Xi’an Jiaotong-Liverpool University, Suzhou, 215123, Jiangsu Province, China

    Zheng Feei Ma

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  1. Hang Zhou
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Correspondence to Zheng Feei Ma.

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All procedures performed in the retrospective study involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the Ethics Committee of the Northern Jiangsu People’s Hospital (reference no. 2018063) and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.

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The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

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Hang Zhou and Yiming Lu share co-first authorship.

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Zhou, H., Lu, Y., Pan, B. et al. Iodine Deficiency as Assessed by Neonatal TSH in a Sample of Mother-and-Newborn Pairs in Jiangsu Province, China. Biol Trace Elem Res 199, 70–75 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12011-020-02135-6

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