Citation
Sotres-Alvarez, Daniela T.; Herring, Amy H.; & Siega-Riz, Anna Maria (2013). Latent Transition Models to Study Women's Changing of Dietary Patterns from Pregnancy to 1 Year Postpartum. American Journal of Epidemiology, 177(8), 852-861. PMCID: PMC3668424Abstract
Latent class models are useful for classifying subjects by dietary patterns. Our goals were to use latent transition models to identify dietary patterns during pregnancy and postpartum, to estimate the prevalence of these dietary patterns, and to model transition probabilities between dietary patterns as a function of covariates. Women who were enrolled in the Pregnancy, Infection, and Nutrition Study (University of North Carolina, 2000–2005) were followed for 1 year postpartum, and their diets were assessed in the second trimester and at 3 and 12 months postpartum (n = 519, 484, and 374, respectively) by using a food frequency questionnaire. After adjusting for energy intake, parity, smoking status, race, and education, we identified 3 dietary patterns and named them “prudent,” “health conscious Western,” and “Western.” Nulliparas were 2.9 and 2.1 times more likely to be in the “prudent” class than the “health conscious Western” or the “Western” class, respectively. The 3 dietary patterns were very stable, with the “health conscious Western” class being the least stable; the probability for staying in the same class was 0.74 and 0.87 at 3 and 12 months postpartum, respectively. Breastfeeding mothers were more likely than nonbreastfeeding mothers to switch dietary pattern class (P = 0.0286). Except for breastfeeding mothers, most women did not switch dietary patterns from pregnancy to postpartum.URL
http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/aje/kws303Reference Type
Journal ArticleYear Published
2013Journal Title
American Journal of EpidemiologyAuthor(s)
Sotres-Alvarez, Daniela T.Herring, Amy H.
Siega-Riz, Anna Maria
PMCID
PMC3668424ORCiD
Siega-Riz - 0000-0002-1303-4248Sotres-Alvarez - 0000-0002-3226-6140