According to a study, 90% of pregnant women don’t consume enough nutrients to meet their nutritional needs and are forced to take supplements.

They also found that 95% of the inexpensive nutritional supplements that were available did not contain the proper amount of important micronutrients which are required to make up for the nutritional deficit.

Nutrition is important for the health of both mom and baby. A lack of certain nutrients can lead to birth defects, low weight at birth, preterm birth and other health issues. A surplus of certain nutrients can also affect the way the body develops in the newborn and increase the risk of health problems later.

It is important to choose a prenatal supplement and eat a healthy diet. The study followed 2,450 pregnant women. The first thing that was done was to analyze the data about what women consumed and ate during their pregnancy.

The NIH then determined the amount of iron, calcium and vitamin A each person was getting just from food, as well as the quantities they needed to meet the nutritional guidelines for pregnant women. The researchers then compared more than 20,000 supplements that contained additional nutrients.

Only one supplement was found to provide pregnant women with the best possible amounts of essential nutrients. The monthly cost of this supplement may be prohibitive for some people, and pregnant women must take seven pills per day.

The results of this study will assist pregnant women, their doctors and nutritionists in identifying important nutrients that are lacking in their diets and in choosing prenatal supplements to provide these nutrients. These results can be used by manufacturers of dietary supplement to optimize product dosage.

The results of the study highlight a need for convenient, inexpensive prenatal supplements that provide optimal quantities of essential nutrients. It is important to conduct more research on the nutrients found in food, so that pregnant women can get these nutrients every day.