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Introduction: The health of the new-born is largely a function of the mother's nutritional, general and reproductive health status. The impact of mother’s health and nutritional status on the foetus can take action through epigenetics. Malnutrition of the mother during pregnancy can result in offspring more prone to developing diabetes later in life. Rare studies on the transgenerational inheritance of epigenetic modifications induced by the exposure to macro- and micronutrients showed that, for example, in utero exposure to a high- fat diet can result in increased body size in third-generation female offspring when passed through the paternal line. Objective: The objective of this study was to analyse reproductive health and nutritional status of Croatian women due to its importance in epigenetic conditioning of offspring. Materials and Methods: The study was specifically designed to analyse reproductive health and nutritional habits of women. A total of 588 women, average age of 30.8 years (16 to 57) completed an on-line questionnaire. The questionnaire is a result of long term research on reproductive age women and consists of 56 questions on basic anthropometry and socio- economic data, reproductive health, menstrual cycle, pregnancy, sexual behaviour and psychophysical health. Results: Of all interviewed women, 60.0% were pregnant at least once with a 16.9% abortion rate. The pregnancies were planned in73.6% of cases. Conditions related to reproductive health (polycystic ovary syndrome, candidiasis, frequent genitourinary tract infections etc.) were very commonly reported (49.3%). Additionally, 58.5% of respondents reported some form of irregularity in their menstrual cycle, and 44.5% reported iron deficiency anaemia. Only 26.9% of respondents understood the influence that body weight has on female reproductive health. Interviewed women practiced fad diets widely with 59.1% of respondents that tried from three to more than ten fad diets. Only 7.0% of women reported a prescribed weight reduction diet for improvement of reproductive health. From the aspect of epigenetic conditioning it is important that 20.5% of respondents reported that they plan pregnancy within a calendar year. Conclusions: There is little knowledge of the interrelation between nutritional status, reproductive health and health of future offspring among Croatian female population. All efforts addressing important issues of women’s reproductive health are more than welcomed. |
