Certain nutrients can slow the impacts of FASD on children from disrupted families. Diet matters.

Melanie McGrice is an Advanced Accredited Practising Dietitian with a Masters in Dietetics.
She specialises in Early Life Nutrition, also known as the 1st 1000 days, from preconception to toddlerhood, when a child's brain, body and immune system grows the fastest to set the foundations for a child's future. She's also a Permanent Care Mum.
When Melanie began fostering and later a permanent care Mum she did the research that planted a seed. So many children in foster care /permanent care were born to parents who had alcohol during pregnancy or who had a drug addiction.
So Melanie used her training and knowledge in nutrition to do some further research into FASD (Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder).
What did Melanie find?
Nutrients that were deficient because of alcohol or FASD.
Nutrients that could slow the impact of FASD.
Nutrients that were in smaller volumes in children from FASD.
Impacts after puberty.
Melanie wants us to do a blood screen of nutrient markers so that you can treat the deficiencies ASAP. Makes sense. That combined with a nutrition assessment might do wonders for our community of children.
Find out more about her research here.

00:00 - Start
01:08 - Fostering and permanent care led to a focus on the first 1,000 days with nutrition
04:25 - Links between FASD and nutrition: alcohol impacts nutrition by impacting appetite and absorption
08:06 - Research tells us that particular nutrients are impacted by alcohol during pregnancy, that particular nutrients are low in these children, that particular nutrients can slow or reduce the severity of FASD and that kids who had FASD have less intake of Vit D, fat and calcium
11:16 - Key messages: get a blood test on your child's nutrient markers and a nutrition assessment through a dietician with pregnancy or paediatrics expertise ASAP. Consider choline as the best research at the moment shows that babies dont have enough choline, which is an important nutrient for brain development.
14:11 - Supplement through food if you can and supplements where its not possible
17:30 - Research suggests these children have impaired satiety so they snack more. Also suggests they are more active and eat more. Ensure others know this and dont assume when they leave the table they aren't hungry. It may be they need more occasions to eat as they cant sit still to eat. They have a higher risk of disordered eating and constipation is common.
21:26 - Fussy eaters? Play games and use strategies to keep them at the table. If you change something, go very very slowly.
25:00 - For older children: post puberty girls can put on too much weight so be aware of this impact.
26:50 - Safe Spaces?

Access the transcript here https://www.pcafamilies.org.au/suppor...

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