Research
Micronutrients & recovery
Periconceptional multivitamin supplementation significantly reduces the risk of neural tube defects, limb reduction defects, and congenital urinary tract anomalies.
Taking a multivitamin before pregnancy can help prevent neural tube defects, limb reduction defects, and urinary tract anomalies. It provides a broader range of nutrients than folic acid alone.
GoodSupportsMEDIUM confidence
Pooling data from 5 case-control and 2 cohort-controlled trials... resulted in a significant 49% decrease in risk (RR 0.51, 95% CI 0.31-0.82) of occurrent neural tube defects due to periconceptional multivitamin supplementation... For limb reduction defects (RR ranges from 0.43-0.59 for all analyses) and congenital urinary tract anomalies (RR ranges from 0.17-0.68 for all analyses), the evidence shows a modest but persistent risk reduction with the use of multivitamins, rather than folic acid.
Why this rating
Based on case-control and cohort studies.
Source
Preconception care: nutritional risks and interventions
Sohni V Dean et al. · Reproductive Health · 2014
DOI 10.1186/1742-4755-11-s3-s3
Meta-analysis · 146 studiesCited 282×
Read the paper DOI resolved against Crossref · corpus check 2026-06-10
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