352 Outcomes of diet control in gestational diabetes during pregnancy with counselling and food nutrition mobile application

Background Poorly controlled Gestational Diabetes Mellitus (GDM) is associated with complications in both mother and infant. The first line of management for these women is dietary modifications but maintaining a healthy and well-balanced diet can be a huge feat to some. Together with the Dietetics Department, we provided counselling and used a food diary mobile application to help pregnant women with GDM to track their dietary intake so as to improve their diabetic control. Objectives Our objective is to report the clinical profiles, dietary habits, and outcomes of pregnancy of these recruited women. Methods A prospective pilot of 30 pregnant women with GDM diagnosed after Oral Glucose Tolerance test at 26 weeks of pregnancy were recruited from April 2019 to June 2020. All received counselling by a diabetic nurse and dietician, and their caloric and nutritious intakes were recorded in the food diary mobile application. Their infants’ outcomes, birth weight and blood glucose levels were also tracked. Means were presented with standard deviations for the continuous and normally distributed data. Results There were 17 Chinese, 10 Malay, and 3 Indian pregnant women with GDM reviewed. The mean maternal weight, height and BMI of these women were 67.4 kg (SD: 12.5), 1.60m (SD: 0.08), 26.1 kg/m2 (SD: 4.4) at recruitment. Their mean age was 32.6 years old (SD: 3.8). Their median HbA1c was 5.4 mol/dL. The average daily caloric, protein, fat, carbohydrates, sugar and calcium intake of these women were 1056 kcal (SD: 245.8), 54.5 g (SD: 15.2), 121 g (SD: 13.2), 24 g (SD: 11.8) and 385.4 g (SD: 215.8) respectively. All of them consumed carbohydrates well below the recommended level which is 175 g and almost all of their average caloric intakes were below their estimated individualized caloric budget. There was no stillbirth, perinatal asphyxia, serious birth injuries or serious neonatal complications among the infants. The mean birth weight and gestation of the infants were 3.14 kg (SD: 0.57) and 38 completed weeks (SD: 1.5). 2 of them were delivered late premature, and 3 had a birth weight of more than 4 kg. 2 infants had hypoglycemia which responded to supplement feeds without intravenous infusion. Conclusions These findings suggest that diet-counselling and using a food diary mobile application can encourage pregnant women with GDM to adopt a healthy and well-balanced diet during their pregnancy, which can therefore help to reduce the complications in both mother and infant.