ABSTRACT
Malnutrition of children during the first two years of life constitutes a public health concern in Brazil, particularly in the Northeast. Most of the nutrition data are concerned with protein-energy malnutrition and hypovitaminosis A. The purpose of this cross-sectional study was to assess the essential fatty acid (EFA) status, which is crucial in physical and mental development, and that of vitamin E which prevents against the oxidative loss of EFA physiological properties, in 81 full-term newborns. Blood samples were obtained from the residual blood of the umbilical cord (UC) at delivery. Fatty acid composition of UC plasma did not show any sign of EFA deficiency. The levels of docosahexanoic (DHA) and arachidonic acid (AA) appeared to be quite similar to those obtained in European populations. UC plasma vitamin E content was 6.31 +/- 1.99 mumol/L whereas the lipid-normalized vitamin E was 2.36 mumol/mmol of lipids. An interesting point was that newborns with vitamin E inferior to the median value (5.80 mumol/L) revealed significantly lower contents of linoleic acid and DHA in UC than newborns superior to the median value. Together with the absolute or normalized plasma level of vitamin E, this supports the observation that one quarter of the community's newborns is deficient in vitamin E.