Table Of ContentWeight Gain During Pregnancy:
Reexamining the Guidelines
Kathleen M. Rasmussen and Ann L. Yaktine, Editors
Committee to Reexamine IOM Pregnancy Weight Guidelines
Food and Nutrition Board and Board on Children, Youth, and Families
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This study was supported by Contract No. HHSH250200446009I TO HHSH240G5806 between the
National Academy of Sciences and U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Health Resources and
Services Administration; Contract No. 200-2007-M-21619 between the National Academy of Sciences
and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Division of Nutrition and Physical Activity and Obesity;
Contract No. N01-OD-4-2139 TO 192 between the National Academy of Sciences and National Institutes
of Health Institute of Child Health and Human Development; Contract No. N01-OD-4-2139 TO 192
between the National Academy of Sciences and National Institutes of Health National Institute of
Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases; Contract No. HHSP23300700522P between the National
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Health and Human Services Office of Disease Prevention and Health Promotion; and Contract No. 21-
FY07-576 between the National Academy of Sciences and March of Dimes. Additional support came
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Suggested citation: IOM (Institute of Medicine). 2009. Weight Gain During Pregnancy: Reexamining the
Guidelines. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press.
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COMMITTEE ON THE REEXAMINATION OF IOM PREGNANCY WEIGHT
GUIDELINES
KATHLEEN M. RASMUSSEN (Chair), Professor of Nutrition, Division of Nutritional
Sciences, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY
BARBARA ABRAMS, Professor, School of Public Health, University of California–Berkeley
LISA M. BODNAR, Assistant Professor, Department of Epidemiology, University of Pittsburgh,
PA
CLAUDE BOUCHARD, Executive Director and George A. Bray Chair in Nutrition, Pennington
Biomedical Research Center, Baton Rouge, LA
NANCY BUTTE, Professor of Pediatrics, Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, TX
PATRICK M. CATALANO, Chair, Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Case Western
Reserve University, Cleveland, OH
MATTHEW GILLMAN, Professor, Department of Ambulatory Care and Prevention, Harvard
Medical School and Harvard Pilgrim Health Care, Boston, MA
FERNANDO A. GUERRA, Director of Health, San Antonio Metropolitan Health District, TX
PAULA A. JOHNSON, Executive Director, Connors Center for Women’s Health and Gender
Biology, Chief, Division of Women’s Health, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Boston, MA
MICHAEL C. LU, Associate Professor of Obstetrics, Gynecology, and Public Health, Schools of
Medicine and Public Health, University of California–Los Angeles
ELIZABETH R. McANARNEY, Professor and Chair Emerita, Department of Pediatrics, School
of Medicine and Dentistry, University of Rochester, NY
RAFAEL PEREZ-ESCAMILLA, Professor of Nutritional Sciences & Public Health, Director,
NIH EXPORT Center for Eliminating Health Disparities among Latinos, University of
Connecticut, Storrs
DAVID A. SAVITZ, Charles W. Bluhdorn Professor of Community & Preventive Medicine,
Director, Epidemiology, Biostatistics, and Disease Prevention Institute, Mount Sinai School of
Medicine, New York, NY
ANNA MARIA SIEGA-RIZ, Associate Professor, Department of Epidemiology, School of
Public Health, University of North Carolina–Chapel Hill
Study Staff
ANN L. YAKTINE, Senior Program Officer
HEATHER B. DEL VALLE, Research Associate
M. JENNIFER DATILES, Senior Program Assistant
ANTON BANDY, Financial Officer
GERALDINE KENNEDO, Administrative Assistant
LINDA D. MEYERS, Food and Nutrition Board Director
ROSEMARY CHALK, Director, Board on Children, Youth, and Families
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Reviewers
This report has been reviewed in draft form by individuals chosen for their diverse
perspectives and technical expertise, in accordance with procedures approved by the National
Research Council's (NRC’s) Report Review Committee. The purpose of this independent review
is to provide candid and critical comments that will assist the institution in making its published
report as sound as possible and to ensure that the report meets institutional standards for
objectivity, evidence, and responsiveness to the study charge. The review comments and draft
manuscript remain confidential to protect the integrity of the deliberative process. We wish to
thank the following individuals for their review of this report:
Haywood Brown, Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Duke University Medical Center,
Durham, NC
Cutberto Garza, Boston College, MA
Susan Gennaro, William F. Connell School of Nursing, Boston College, MA
William Goodnight, Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Division of Maternal-Fetal
Medicine, University of North Carolina–Chapel Hill School of Medicine
Erica P. Gunderson, Division of Research, Kaiser Permanente, Oakland, CA
Maxine Hayes, Department of Health, State of Washington, Tumwater
Lorraine V. Klerman, The Heller School for Social Policy and Management, Brandeis
University, Waltham, MA
Kristine G. Koski, School of Dietetics and Human Nutrition, McGill University, Ste. Anne de
Bellevue, Quebec, Canada
Charles Lockwood, Department of Obstetrics, Gynecology, and Reproductive Sciences,
Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, CT
Dawn Misra, Division of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Department of Family Medicine and
Public Health Sciences, Wayne State University School of Medicine, Detroit, MI
Jose M. Ordovas, Nutrition and Genomics Laboratory, Jean Mayer USDA Human Nutrition
Research Center on Aging, Tufts University, Boston, MA
Roy M. Pitkin, University of California–Los Angeles (Professor Emeritus)
David Rush, Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy (Professor Emeritus), Tufts
University, Boston, MA
Jeanette South-Paul, Department of Family Medicine, University of Pittsburgh, PA
Although the reviewers listed above have provided many constructive comments and
suggestions, they were not asked to endorse the conclusions or recommendations nor did they
see the final draft of the report before its release. The review of this report was overseen by Neal
A. Vanselow, Tulane University, Professor Emeritus and Nancy E. Adler, Departments of
Psychiatry and Pediatrics and Center for Health and Community, University of California–San
Francisco.
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Appointed by the NRC and Institute of Medicine, they were responsible for making certain
that an independent examination of this report was carried out in accordance with institutional
procedures and that all review comments were carefully considered. Responsibility for the final
content of this report rests entirely with the authoring committee and the institution.
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viii
Preface
In the last century, many answers have been given by health professionals to the question
“how much weight should I gain while I am pregnant?” In the early 1900's, the answer was often
only 15-20 pounds. Between 1970 and 1990, the guideline for weight gain during pregnancy was
higher, 20-25 pounds, and in 1990, with the publication of Nutrition During Pregnancy, it went
higher still for some groups of women. This most recent guideline reflected new knowledge
about the importance of maternal body fatness before conception, as measured by body mass
index, for the outcome of pregnancy. It had become clear that heavier women could gain less
weight and still deliver an infant of good size. Since that time, the obesity epidemic has not
spared women of reproductive age. In our population today, more women of reproductive age are
severely obese (obesity class III; 8 percent) than are underweight (3 percent) and their short- and
long-term health has become a concern in addition to the size of the infant at birth. Clearly the
time had come to reexamine the guidelines for weight gain during pregnancy.
To prepare for this possibility, the National Research Council and the Institute of Medicine
held a workshop in 2006 to evaluate the availability of data that could be used reexamine the
current guidelines. Based on the outcome of this workshop, numerous federal agencies
(Department of Health and Human Services: Health Resources Services Administration; Centers
for Disease Control and Prevention Division of Nutrition, Physical Activity, and Obesity;
National Institutes of Health: The Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and
Development; National Institute of Diabetes, Digestive and Kidney Diseases, Division of
Nutrition Research Coordination Office on Women’s Health; Office on Disease Prevention and
Health Promotion; and Office on Minority Health; as well as the March of Dimes) agreed to
sponsor the work of this committee.
The committee was asked to review the determinants and a wide range of short- and long-
term consequences of variation in weight gain during pregnancy for both the mother and her
infant. Based on the outcome of this review, the committee was asked to recommend revisions to
the current guidelines if this was deemed to be necessary. In addition, the committee was asked
to consider the approaches that might be necessary to promote appropriate weight gain and to
identify gaps in knowledge and make recommendations about priorities for future research.
Although many studies relevant to the committee’s charge have been published since 1990
and the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) completed their report Outcomes
of Maternal Weight Gain while the committee was gathering data, many gaps in knowledge
remained. To address this problem, the committee held a public session with project sponsors,
and two workshops. We are grateful to those who participated in these sessions for sharing their
experience and wisdom. We are also grateful to a number of individuals who supplied data to the
committee: Alan Ryan, Aimin Chen, Andrea Sharma, Joyce Martin, Sharon Kirmeyer, K.S.
Joseph, Marie Cedergren, and Raul Artal, with special thanks to Patricia Dietz. The committee
also commissioned additional analyses of data from both Denmark and the United States. We
thank our consultants, Ellen Aagaard Nohr, Amy Herring, and Cheryl Stein for these analyses
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and for their contributions to the committee’s work. The committee also felt that it was important
to understand what would be involved in analyzing the trade-off between mother and infant in
risk of adverse outcomes of variation in weight gain during pregnancy. To accomplish this, we
commissioned such an analysis based on the data at hand. We thank our consultant, James
Hammitt, for conducting these analyses and for his contribution to the committee’s work.
The committee’s 14 members gave freely of their expertise and volunteered their time and
energy in all aspects of the preparation of this report, from developing its intellectual framework,
writing the text and deliberating about the recommendations and conclusions of the report. Their
efforts merit our sincere gratitude.
The committee received excellent staff support from Ann Yaktine, Study Director, Heather
Del Valle, Research Associate and Jennifer Datiles, Senior Program Assistant. Their effort on
our behalf is sincerely appreciated. Both the Director of the Food and Nutrition Board, Linda
Meyers, and the Director of the Board on Children, Youth and Families, Rosemary Chalk,
contributed their wisdom and support to this effort and we thank them for it.
Kathleen M. Rasmussen, Chair
Committee to Reexamine IOM Pregnancy Weight Guidelines
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