Evaluation of the association between maternal folic acid supplementation and the risk of congenital heart disease : a systematic review and meta-analysis

Cheng, Zhengpei and Gu, Rui and Lian, Zenglin and Gu, Harvest F. (2022) Evaluation of the association between maternal folic acid supplementation and the risk of congenital heart disease : a systematic review and meta-analysis. Nutrition Journal, 21. 20. ISSN 1475-2891 (https://doi.org/10.1186/s12937-022-00772-2)

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Abstract

Background: Folic acid (FA), as a synthetic form of folate, has been widely used for dietary supplementation in pregnant women. The preventive effect of FA supplementation on the occurrence and recurrence of fetal neural tube defects (NTD) has been confirmed. Incidence of congenital heart diseases (CHD), however, has been parallelly increasing worldwide. The present study aimed to evaluate whether FA supplementation is associated with a decreased risk of CHD. Methods: We searched the literature using PubMed, Web of Science and Google Scholar, for the peer-reviewed studies which reported CHD and FA and followed with a meta-analysis. The study-specific relative risks were used as summary statistics for the association between maternal FA supplementation and CHD risk. Cochran's Q and I2 statistics were used to test for the heterogeneity. Results: Maternal FA supplementation was found to be associated with a decreased risk of CHD (OR = 0.82, 95% CI: 0.72–0.94). However, the heterogeneity of the association was high (P < 0.001, I2 = 92.7%). FA supplementation within 1 month before and after pregnancy correlated positively with CHD (OR 1.10, 95%CI 0.99–1.23), and high-dose FA intake is positively associated with atrial septal defect (OR 1.23, 95%CI 0.64–2.34). Pregnant women with irrational FA use may be at increased risk for CHD. Conclusions: Data from the present study indicate that the heterogeneity of the association between maternal FA supplementation and CHD is high and suggest that the real relationship between maternal FA supplementation and CHD may need to be further investigated with well-designed clinical studies and biological experiments.

  • Item type:Article
    ID code:80984
    Dates:
    Date
    Event
    26 March 2022
    Published
    12 March 2022
    Accepted
    Subjects:Medicine
    Department:UNSPECIFIED
    Depositing user: Pure Administrator
    Date deposited:09 Jun 2022 10:40
    Last modified:09 Apr 2024 03:17
    URI:https://strathprints.strath.ac.uk/id/eprint/80984
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