December 17/NewsRx Health & Science -- Researchers from LSU Health Sciences Center New Orleans School of Public Health, Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD), Harvard School of Public Health, Brigham and Women's Hospital, and Harvard Medical School, have found for the first time that drinking more than five servings of sugar-sweetened cola a week prior to pregnancy appears to significantly elevate the risk of developing diabetes during pregnancy. Liwei Chen, MD, PhD, Assistant Professor of Epidemiology at LSU Health Sciences Center New Orleans School of Public Health, is the lead author of the paper "A Prospective Study of Pre-Gravid Sugar-Sweetened Beverage Consumption and the Risk of Gestational Diabetes Mellitus" that will be published in the December 2009 issue of Diabetes Care and is available online now at http://diabetes.org/diabetescare. The research team studied a group of 13,475 women from the Nurses' Health Study II. During 10 years of follow-up, 860 incident GDM cases were identified.

After adjustment for known risk factors for GDM including age, family history of diabetes, parity, physical activity, smoking status, sugar-sweetened beverage intake, alcohol intake, prepregnancy BMI, and Western dietary pattern, intake of sugar-sweetened cola was positively associated with the risk of GDM. No significant association was found for other sugar-sweetened beverages or diet beverages. "Compared with women who consumed less than one serving per month, those who consumed more than five servings per week of sugar-sweetened cola had a 22% greater GDM risk," notes Dr. Chen. Gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM), defined as glucose intolerance beginning during pregnancy, is one of the most common pregnancy complications. Women with GDM are at increased risk for complications and illness during pregnancy and delivery, as well as post-pregnancy type 2 diabetes. Children of mothers with GDM are at increased risk for obesity, glucose intolerance, and early onset diabetes.