Gonna Soak Up the Sun? Vitamin D Now May Benefit Baby Later

Grab the sunscreen and your sunglasses, Mom-to-be! Getting some sunshine may be beneficial to your baby's language development.

The Scoop

Elementary school for your yet-to-be-born baby may seem a long way off, but getting enough of the vitamin D during pregnancy may make a crucial difference in your child's language development during his or her school age years.

In the largest study of its kind to date, researchers from the Telethon Institute for Child Health Research in Perth, Australia, looked at vitamin D (aka the "sunshine vitamin") levels in more than 700 pregnant women. They then conducted regular checkups with children until age 17. Researchers found that very young children showed no real differences in language development whether or not their moms got enough vitamin D during pregnancy. Significant differences in language development, however, were detected once kids hit school age—moms with low vitamin D levels during pregnancy were twice as likely to have children who experienced language difficulties between the ages of 5 and 10 years old compared to children whose moms had adequate intake of the sunshine vitamin during pregnancy.

"The developing baby is completely reliant on the mother for its vitamin D levels and what we have shown is that this might have an impact on the child's brain development," says lead researcher Dr. Andrew Whitehouse.

Your Pregnancy

Direct sunlight is the body's main source of vitamin D, but with skin cancer concerns and most people, in general, spending less time spent outdoors, vitamin D deficiency has increased over the past two decades, says researchers. The solution? To maintain adequate levels of vitamin D, moms-to-be can try adding more foods that are naturally rich in vitamin D, such as salmon and vitamin D-fortified milk. Taking a prenatal vitamin that provides the RDI for vitamin D is another option.

Next for Dr. Whitehouse is seeing whether moms who take vitamin D supplements during pregnancy could help with child language development. ''We certainly don't endorse women going out into the sun unprotected, so the next step is to look at whether vitamin D supplements in pregnancy could reduce the risk of language problems for children," he says.