Matern Child Nutr. 2026 Jul;22(3):e70221. doi: 10.1111/mcn.70221.
ABSTRACT
Adequate nutrition during pregnancy is critical for mothers and newborns, but few studies have characterized maternal diets. The Global Diet Quality Score (GDQS) is a new metric to evaluate population diets. This study examined GDQS during pregnancy and its influencing factors in rural Uttar Pradesh, India. Data were from the Alive & Thrive (A&T) impact evaluation study, a cluster-randomized trial testing behavior change communication delivered through the antenatal care (ANC) platform. We analyzed multi-pass 24-h dietary recalls combined from two cross-sectional surveys, at baseline (2017, n = 660) prior to intervention and endline (2019, n = 674). The GDQS was constructed based on grams/day of 25 food groups consumed (range 0-49); for 16 healthy food groups (GDQS+), higher scores indicated higher consumption, whereas for 9 unhealthy food groups (GDQS-), scoring was reversed with higher scores reflecting lower consumption. Maternal and household factors influencing GDQS examined in a multivariable linear regression model included age, education, parity, nutrition knowledge, ANC visits, household size, religion, caste, socio-economic status (SES), and food insecurity, adjusted for pregnancy duration, survey time, and A&T intervention. The mean (SD) at 18.5 (3.4) for overall GDQS, 7.3 (3.2) for GDQS+, and 11.2 (1.6) for GDQS- was low. Factors positively associated with overall GDQS and GDQS+ were 4+ ANC visits (β = 0.83 and 0.78), nutrition knowledge (β = 0.12 and 0.13), and SES (β = 0.82 and 0.96). Maternal education (β = 0.66) and caste (β = -0.66) were significantly associated with GDQS+ while no factors were associated with GDQS-. This study highlights poor diet quality during pregnancy in this context.
PMID:42604575 | DOI:10.1111/mcn.70221
