Research

Mixed

Combined diet and exercise interventions during pregnancy reduce the risk of developing gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM) compared to standard care alone, with moderate-quality evidence showing a possible reduction in risk (RR 0.85).

If you are pregnant, engaging in a combined program of healthy eating and physical activity, as guided by healthcare providers, may help lower your risk of developing gestational diabetes compared to standard care alone. While the statistical evidence is not definitive, the trend is favorable, and these lifestyle changes also support overall maternal and infant health.

ModerateQualifiesMEDIUM confidence
For our primary review outcomes, there was a possible reduced risk of GDM in the diet and exercise intervention group compared with the standard care group (average risk ratio (RR) 0.85, 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.71 to 1.01; 6633 women; 19 RCTs; Tau2 = 0.05; I2 = 42%; P = 0.07; moderate-quality evidence).
Emily Shepherd et al. · Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews · 2017

Why this rating

Moderate-quality evidence per GRADE, limited by unclear risk of bias and heterogeneity (I2=42%).

Source

Combined diet and exercise interventions for preventing gestational diabetes mellitus

Emily Shepherd et al. · Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews · 2017

DOI 10.1002/14651858.cd010443.pub3

Meta-analysis · 23 studiesCited 241×
Read the paper
DOI resolved against Crossref · corpus check 2026-06-10

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