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The challenges in gestational weight gain monitoring in low and middle income settings

European Journal of Clinical Nutrition volume 77, pages 764–765 (2023)Cite this article

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We greatly appreciate the recent correspondence on our article and the accompanying editorial [1,2,3]. Monitoring Gestational Weight Gain (GWG) in various populations is a critical clinical need that has yet to be adequately addressed. The current paradigm for monitoring GWG at a clinical level is to use a chart to track whether a pregnant woman is gaining weight within the recommended range for GWG throughout pregnancy. The debate between use of prescriptive one-size-fits-all standards and reference charts for monitoring GWG and growth in general is far from settled.

While global standards may have practical public health advantages, we cannot ignore the evidence demonstrating their limitations. The foundational argument of prescriptive global standards is that when socioeconomic and medical constraints are met, ethnic differences in characteristics like fetal growth and gestational weight gain are negligible. While direct evidence on the applicability of global GWG standards to different populations is not yet tested, there is emerging evidence on use of global standards for fetal growth monitoring in different populations.

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Data availability

The data underlying this manuscript is available upon reasonable request to the corresponding author.

References

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Pondicherry Institute of Medical Sciences, Puducherry, India

    Ramachandran Thiruvengadam

  2. Translational Health Science and Technology Institute, Faridabad, Haryana, India

    Bapu Koundinya Desiraju & Shinjini Bhatnagar

  3. Sitaram Bhartia Institute of Science and Research, New Delhi, India

    Harshpal Singh Sachdev

Authors
  1. Ramachandran Thiruvengadam
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  2. Bapu Koundinya Desiraju
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  3. Harshpal Singh Sachdev
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  4. Shinjini Bhatnagar
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Contributions

RT wrote the first draft of the manuscript; SB, HSS and BKD reviewed and revised the same. All authors approved the final draft.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Shinjini Bhatnagar.

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Thiruvengadam, R., Desiraju, B.K., Sachdev, H.S. et al. The challenges in gestational weight gain monitoring in low and middle income settings. Eur J Clin Nutr 77, 764–765 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41430-023-01292-w

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41430-023-01292-w

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