Abstract
Purpose :
The third trimester of pregnancy is when the mother transfers macular pigment carotenoids to her child for deposition in the developing macula. However, there is a dearth of evidence on how prenatal carotenoid supplementation impacts infants’ carotenoid status. Therefore, in this randomized clinical trial (NCT03750968), we sought to determine the effects of prenatal lutein (L) and zeaxanthin (Z) supplementation on newborn infants’ ocular and systemic carotenoid status.
Methods :
47 pregnant women were randomized 1:1 to receive standard-of-care daily prenatal vitamins with or without 10 mg of L and 2 mg of Z for 6 to 8 months. The primary outcome assessed maternal carotenoid status in the serum, skin, and eye at the end of each trimester and postpartum with HPLC, resonance Raman spectroscopy, and dual-wavelength autofluorescence, respectively. The secondary outcome reported here measured infants’ carotenoid concentrations in the umbilical cord blood, skin, and eyes using similar techniques as above but optimized for infants. Student’s t-test compared infants’ carotenoid status in either experimental group, and a p-value of 0.05 was considered statistically significant.
Results :
Infants whose mothers were in the Carotenoid Group (n = 19) had a significant 5-fold increase in cord blood serum L + Z concentrations, over a 3-fold increase in cord blood total carotenoids, and a 38% increase in skin carotenoid status compared to the Control Group (n = 18) (p < 0.0001 for all). Although not statistically significant, infants whose mothers were in the Carotenoid Group had a 20% increase in macular pigment compared to those in the Control Group (p = 0.242).
Conclusions :
Prenatal carotenoid supplementation considerably enhances infants’ systemic and ocular carotenoid status during pregnancy and could provide health benefits to babies. Our results will be invaluable to design and power future large-scale studies on prenatal lutein and zeaxanthin supplementation.
This abstract was presented at the 2023 ARVO Annual Meeting, held in New Orleans, LA, April 23-27, 2023.