Monitoring Weight Gain Of Pregnant Prevents Baby's Risk Of Failure To Grow

Illustration of a pregnant woman (Photo: Antara)

JAKARTA - Monitoring the weight gain of pregnant women is important to prevent babies from experiencing stunting or failure to grow and develop in the future, advises nutrition expert from the University of Indonesia, Dr. Rita Ramayulis, DCN, MKes.

"For pregnant women, in order to prevent the risk of stunting going down, even if they check their weight gain," Rita said in the online launch of the book Prevent Stunting Before Genting some time ago, as reported by Antara.

Rita, who serves as Chair of the Indonesia Sports Nutritionist Association (ISNA), even suggested that people, including teenagers, get used to asking questions about the weight gain they got.

"So when we meet pregnant women, we make it a habit to ask how much weight they have gained. That is the main indicator, weight gain," she said.

Regarding proper weight gain, pregnant women can ask the doctor or health worker. How much gain is recommended depends on your body mass index (BMI). BMI is a measure of body fat calculated from weight and height.

According to WebMD, generally, a woman who had an average pre-pregnancy weight should gain 11.33 to 16.3 kg when she was pregnant.

Thin women are advised to add 12.7 to 18.4 kg. Regarding eating patterns that can be practiced during pregnancy, there are several things that can be done, namely trying to eat 5-6 times, eating healthy snacks such as nuts, raisins, fruits such as apples, bananas, or yogurt.

While those who are overweight may only need to gain 6.8 to 11.33 kg during pregnancy. In general, the recommended weight gain is about 0.9 -1.8 kg during the first 3 months of pregnancy.

According to Rita, not a few pregnant women can't reach the weight recommended by health experts. If this is the case, there are a number of things that can be evaluated, including parenting that may be wrong or the lack of attention from the community and the surrounding environment for pregnant women.

"If it is not fulfilled, what is the matter, what parenting pattern is wrong, there is a perception in the community that pregnant women are normal things so they don't need to be considered, they don't care about the state of pregnancy," she said.

According to the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), a mother's weight gain during pregnancy is important for the health of her pregnancy and that of her baby.

Mothers who weigh less than the recommended number are associated with low birth weight babies and lead to a higher risk of illness and developmental delays.

Meanwhile, if the mother's weight is higher than the recommended amount, it is associated with the baby being born too big and this can cause birth complications and the child will be obese.