It is important for women to be losing weight in the three to 12 months after they give birth or they could face higher risks for diabetes and heart disease later on, according to a new study. Three months after delivering their babies, most mothers still retained some extra weight they gained during pregnancy and that posed no apparent extra risk.
Three-quarters of mothers lost weight in the period after that. But those who retained the excess weight or even gained were found to have some elevated risks. “That failure to lose weight between three and 12 months after delivery was associated with the development of an adverse risk profile for diabetes and heart disease,” said principal researcher Dr. Ravi Retnakaran, an endocrinologist at Toronto’s Mount Sinai Hospital.
The women who were not losing weight were found to have higher blood pressure, higher levels of bad cholesterol and a greater resistance to insulin.
This does not mean women must get back to their pre-pregnancy weight in that first year, says Retnakaran, but that they should be in the process of losing weight during that time.
Doctors have long suspected this to be the case, but now they have scientific evidence from this study that was published in the journal Diabetes Care this week.
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