Do Prenatal Vitamins Really Work?
Due to our increased knowledge with regard to health, many women have become informed with regard to the importance of prenatal vitamins and their role in preventing birth defects. It is important to know that both mother and child do have increased nutritional needs during pregnancy.Although many women are prescribed prenatal vitamins by their doctors during their pregnancy, it is becoming more common in some areas that even women who are planning to conceive begin taking prenatal vitamins. Thus many women begin protecting their body’s early.
Most Prenatal vitamins are specially formulated to make up for nutritional deficiencies in a mother’s diet, and contain supplements such as vitamins, zinc, iron, and calcium. Perhaps most important, they contain folic acid, which reduces the risk of serious birth defects of the brain and spinal cord. Prenatal vitamins could very well prove to play a vital role in a healthy pregnancy and a healthy baby, due in large part to the great defiencies now found in most of our food. However, prenatal vitamins are not meant to be your sole source of nutrients. They are meant to supplement, or prevent certain nutrient deficiencies. Eating a healthy, varied and balanced diet will go a long way toward ensuring the health of both mother and infant.
IMPORTANT NUTRIENTS FOR MOTHER AND CHILD:
DHA
DHA is a fatty acid belonging to the omega- 3 family, and it is very important for brain development. This nutrient is crucial for the baby from the very beginning of pregnancy through the time of breast feeding. It is essential to the body, but much more so during pregnancy.
IRON
Iron is an important mineral, and most prenatal will have 30 to 40 mg. If a woman is anemic, she should talk to her health care provider about whether she will need more. Additionally, a natural practioner may recommend a different type of iron supplement. During the third trimester of pregnancy, the baby will use a tremendous amount of iron, which comes from the mother’s stored levels.
FOLIC ACID
Folic acid is a must during pregnancy. It is plentiful in dark leafy vegetables, citrus fruits, and whole grains, among other foods. It cuts the risk of birth defects in babies, and is almost always found in prenatal vitamins.
Folic acid has been proven essential to a baby’s neural tube development during the first three months of a woman’s pregnancy. This is the time when the mother is most likely to experience nausea and vomiting. Folic acid is regarded as so important that it is often recommended that women start taking folate, 30 days or more prior to attempting to conceive.
CALCIUM
Calcium is extremely important as well as essential to both the mother and child in pregnancy. Calcium and magnesium help protect the mother’s bones during this time when the demands of both her body as well as the baby’s body for these nutrients must be met. A good prenatal vitamin will contain calcium, but the mother must also eat a well balanced diet to obtain calcium as well.
With regard to prenatal vitamins, they are not all created equal. Most of them try and pack as much as possible into their vitamins, but they must be careful not to promote excess of what may amount to be toxic levels of fat soluble vitamins…for instance Vitamin A instead of beta-carotene, vitamin A’s precursor. The best prenatal needs to provide what mother and child needs, at just the right amounts, as well as avoiding amounts that avoid toxicity.
