Women who regularly consume more than 2 caffeinated beverages a day leading up to conception are more likely to miscarry a pregnancy, according to research published in Fertility and Sterility.
Germaine M. Buck Louis, PhD, director of the Division of Intramural Population Health Research at the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, and colleagues conducted a prospective cohort study comparing lifestyle factors including cigarette use, caffeinated beverage consumption, and multivitamin use in 344 couples with a singleton pregnancy. Each couple was enrolled preconception and was followed daily up to 7 weeks postconception.
Of the 344 couples enrolled, 98 pregnancies (28%) ended in miscarriage. While miscarriage was associated with women 35 years of age and older (hazard ration [HR] 1.96), the researchers also found that caffeine consumption by both men and women was associated with an increased hazard ratio of 1.73 and 1.74, respectively.
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Although earlier studies found similar data, Dr Buck Louis and colleagues noted that those studies were not able to rule out whether the pregnancy loss was linked to caffeine consumption or an unhealthy pregnancy.
“Our findings indicate that the male partner matters, too,” said Dr Buck Louis. “Male preconception consumption of caffeinated beverages was just as strongly associated with pregnancy loss as female.”
Reference
- Buck Louis GM, Sapra KJ, Schisterman EF, et al. Lifestyle and pregnancy loss in a contemporary cohort of women recruited before conception: The LIFE study. Fertil Steril. 2016; doi: 10.1016/j.fertnstert.2016.03.009. In press.
