Menu
Choline and Your Baby's FUTURE
What can choline and other prenatal nutrients accomplish?
In the first 18 months of life for babies in our studies, we ask mothers to complete standard scales that rate the children’s strengths--their ability to stay engaged in quiet play, their ability to tolerate a sudden fall or the presence of a stranger, and their engagement and cuddliness with their parents. Then, from 18 months to 5 years, we ask the mothers to identify their child’s problems, children who cannot sit still and concentrate or who shrink from play with other children. Boys tend to develop slower than girls and therefore ratings take into account the child’s sex. Premature children also develop more slowly, and therefore their gestational age at birth is also considered.
Children whose mothers were given choline supplements were significantly more likely to be in the range considered normal on these ratings than children whose mothers had lower choline levels. In the 3 trials of choline supplements conducted with healthy women in the U.S., ratings outside the range of normal were observed in 10 of 90 (11.1%) children whose mothers received placebo, versus 1 of 89 whose mothers received a choline or phosphatidylcholine supplements (1.1%). A similar difference is found for children whose mothers took folic acid supplements, who are more likely to be in the normal range than children whose mothers did not take folic acid. Most mothers with higher choline levels have also taken prenatal vitamins with folic acid.
In other studies, we asked mothers whose choline levels we had measured to rate the children at 4 years of age using a standard rating instrument for children, the Child Behavior Checklist 1½-5 years. Children whose mothers had optimal levels of choline during the second trimester of pregnancy had fewer problems with attention, social withdrawal, and sleep, compared to children whose mother had lower choline levels.
We also tested the same children using intelligence tests designed for young children. For example, we found that 4-year-old children whose mothers had higher second trimester choline levels in pregnancy were more likely to have normal ability to pay attention to simple tasks appropriate for 4-year-olds, such as picking out one particular animal in rows of animal drawings that contain that particular animal mixed in with other animals.
Other investigators have found positive effects of higher choline intake or supplements on attention and intelligence up to 7 years of age.
Choline, folic acid, and other prenatal vitamins do not produce super babies
Prenatal choline supplements will not produce a new generation of super babies. The clinical data show that choline produces happier, more alert children because higher maternal choline decreases the number of babies whose development is in the lower and lowest range of healthy normal children. Parents may secretly wish for super babies, but increased assurance that your child will be happy, healthy, and most of all, normal, is a more realistic goal.
The mothers’ ratings of their child’s behavior problems and the child’s performance on these early tests of intelligence do not absolutely predict the child’s performance when they reach school age, their ability to make friends among classmates, or their mental health as they grow older. Some children with these problems may develop more slowly than others and may catch up quickly, but others have problems that may plague them throughout most of their life. However, parents who have older children, including adult children who have schizophrenia, have been asked to look back at how their children behaved in very early childhood. On the same scales that we use with the mothers in our research, these parents of children who developed schizophrenia reported that their children had difficulty making friends, couldn’t shift their attention to important things, and had difficulties in social interactions.
Read more: Perinatal Phosphatidylcholine Supplementation and Early Childhood Behavior Problems: Evidence for CHRNA7 Moderation.
In the first 18 months of life for babies in our studies, we ask mothers to complete standard scales that rate the children’s strengths--their ability to stay engaged in quiet play, their ability to tolerate a sudden fall or the presence of a stranger, and their engagement and cuddliness with their parents. Then, from 18 months to 5 years, we ask the mothers to identify their child’s problems, children who cannot sit still and concentrate or who shrink from play with other children. Boys tend to develop slower than girls and therefore ratings take into account the child’s sex. Premature children also develop more slowly, and therefore their gestational age at birth is also considered.
Children whose mothers were given choline supplements were significantly more likely to be in the range considered normal on these ratings than children whose mothers had lower choline levels. In the 3 trials of choline supplements conducted with healthy women in the U.S., ratings outside the range of normal were observed in 10 of 90 (11.1%) children whose mothers received placebo, versus 1 of 89 whose mothers received a choline or phosphatidylcholine supplements (1.1%). A similar difference is found for children whose mothers took folic acid supplements, who are more likely to be in the normal range than children whose mothers did not take folic acid. Most mothers with higher choline levels have also taken prenatal vitamins with folic acid.
In other studies, we asked mothers whose choline levels we had measured to rate the children at 4 years of age using a standard rating instrument for children, the Child Behavior Checklist 1½-5 years. Children whose mothers had optimal levels of choline during the second trimester of pregnancy had fewer problems with attention, social withdrawal, and sleep, compared to children whose mother had lower choline levels.
We also tested the same children using intelligence tests designed for young children. For example, we found that 4-year-old children whose mothers had higher second trimester choline levels in pregnancy were more likely to have normal ability to pay attention to simple tasks appropriate for 4-year-olds, such as picking out one particular animal in rows of animal drawings that contain that particular animal mixed in with other animals.
Other investigators have found positive effects of higher choline intake or supplements on attention and intelligence up to 7 years of age.
Choline, folic acid, and other prenatal vitamins do not produce super babies
Prenatal choline supplements will not produce a new generation of super babies. The clinical data show that choline produces happier, more alert children because higher maternal choline decreases the number of babies whose development is in the lower and lowest range of healthy normal children. Parents may secretly wish for super babies, but increased assurance that your child will be happy, healthy, and most of all, normal, is a more realistic goal.
The mothers’ ratings of their child’s behavior problems and the child’s performance on these early tests of intelligence do not absolutely predict the child’s performance when they reach school age, their ability to make friends among classmates, or their mental health as they grow older. Some children with these problems may develop more slowly than others and may catch up quickly, but others have problems that may plague them throughout most of their life. However, parents who have older children, including adult children who have schizophrenia, have been asked to look back at how their children behaved in very early childhood. On the same scales that we use with the mothers in our research, these parents of children who developed schizophrenia reported that their children had difficulty making friends, couldn’t shift their attention to important things, and had difficulties in social interactions.
Read more: Perinatal Phosphatidylcholine Supplementation and Early Childhood Behavior Problems: Evidence for CHRNA7 Moderation.
Proudly powered by Weebly