Long term effect of calcium supplementation during pregnancy on the blood pressure of offspring: follow up of randomised control trial

Belizan JM, Villar J

1997

Argentina

This is a double blind randomised placebo controlled trial. The subjects were 591 children at mean age of 7 years whose mothers were randomly assigned during pregnancy to receive 2 grams per day of elemental calcium or placebo. Supplementation was started at 20 weeks gestation and continued until delivery. The main conclusion is that calcium supplementation during pregnancy is associated with lower systolic blood pressure in the offspring, particularly among overweight children.

We must underline that all the women eligible for the study were nulliparous, had singleton pregnancies, and had blood pressure values below 140/90 at the time of randomisation. In this study the problem of birth order was therefore eliminated.