Berit L Heitmann
Biographic Data
| ID | 1726006 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Berit L Heitmann |
| GIVEN NAMES | Berit L |
| FAMILY NAME | Heitmann |
| SIGNATURE | HEITMANN B L |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Copenhagen |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-6809-4504 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 43 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 5 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 43 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1995 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 1 |
Exercise and eating motivation in weight loss maintenance: Revisiting the motivational spillover with the NoHoW study
OBJECTIVE: Physical activity and nutrition-related behaviors are crucial factors in maintaining weight loss. The interplay between the motivations to consistently engage in both behaviors is a fundamental yet understudied topic. The current study examines the reciprocal effects between exercise and eating motivation and their effect on steps and energy intake over a 12-month period. METHODS: Data were gathered from 678 NoHoW participants (a weigh…
Preferences for Follow-Up Procedures among Patients Lost to Follow-Up after Smoking Cessation Intervention among Therapists—An Interview Study
Achieving high follow-up rates after smoking cessation interventions (SCIs) is a general challenge. The aim of this study was to identify preferences among patients and therapists for improving follow-up rates and to assess smoking status at 6 months among patients lost to follow-up. From the Danish STOPbase for Tobacco and Nicotine, which collects data on SCI across health care, 20 representative patients lost to follow-up by routine procedures …
Outdoor Kindergartens: A Structural Way to Improve Early Physical Activity Behaviour
This study indicates that children are more physically active during the time they spend in outdoor kindergartens compared to conventional kindergartens, but may compensate with more inactivity outside kindergarten hours
Exploratory analysis of reflective, reactive, and homeostatic eating behaviour traits on weight change during the 18-month NoHoW weight maintenance trial
Behaviour change interventions for weight management have found varied effect sizes and frequent weight re-gain after weight loss. There is interest in exploring whether differences in eating behaviour can be used to develop tailored weight management programs. This secondary analysis of an 18-month weight maintenance randomised controlled trial (RCT) aimed to investigate the association between individual variability in weight maintenance succes…
Comparison of Motor Difficulties Measured in the First Year of School among Children Who Attended Rural Outdoor or Urban Conventional Kindergartens
Our results do not support outdoor kindergartens as a potential intervention to improve motor abilities among children. Randomized controlled trials are needed to confirm these findings
Association between Pre-Pregnancy BMI and Inflammatory Profile Trajectories during Pregnancy and Postpartum in Brazilian Women with Periodontitis: The IMPROVE Trial
This study aimed to explore the association between pre-pregnancy BMI and longitudinal changes in inflammatory markers from the second trimester of pregnancy to 6-8 weeks postpartum in women with periodontitis. This is a secondary exploratory analysis of 68 women who took part in a feasibility clinical trial in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Inflammatory markers included C-reactive protein (CRP), interleukin-6 (IL-6), interleukin-10 (IL-10), and matrix …
Associations between Child Mental Well-Being or Conflicts during Mealtime and Picky Eating Behaviour
Pickiness is an eating behavior that many families with young children face. Having joint family meals may impact the child's pickiness, for instance by influencing their willingness to try novel foods. Moreover, picky children have been shown to display greater emotionality. The aim of this study was to investigate if children's mental well-being and parent-reported conflicts during mealtime were associated with pickiness among obesity-prone chi…
Early Postpartum Stress, Anxiety, Depression, and Resilience Development among Danish First-Time Mothers before and during First-Wave Covid-19 Pandemic
On 11 March 2020, a lockdown to limit the spread of COVID-19 was implemented in Denmark. The pandemic and the lockdown might have caused stress, depression, and anxiety in new mothers. Individuals with high resilience to stress may have been less affected. This study aimed to investigate if changes in perceived stress, anxiety, depression, and resilience from the second trimester until two months postpartum were different before and during the CO…
Longitudinal Associations between Intake of Fruit and Vegetables and Height Attainment from Preschool to School Entry
To examine associations between fruit and vegetable intake in young childhood and height attainment during preschool and at school entry. Data for this study was based on "The Healthy Start" primary intervention study, which included 635 obesity-prone children, (58% boys), from the greater Copenhagen area, with a mean (SD) age of 4.0 (1.1) years (age range 2-6 years) at baseline. In the current study, 553 children (57% boys) were included with in…
Associations between Parental Stress and Subsequent Changes in Dietary Intake and Quality among Preschool Children Susceptible to Obesity
ClinicalTrials.gov, Trial number: NCT01583335, Registered: 31 March 2012, retrospectively registered
Age and Sex Specific Trends in Incidence of Juvenile Idiopathic Arthritis in Danish Birth Cohorts from 1992 to 2002: A Nationwide Register Linkage Study
This study reports age- and sex-specific incidence rates of juvenile idiopathic arthritis (JIA) in complete Danish birth cohorts from 1992 through 2002. Data were obtained from the Danish registries. All persons born in Denmark, from 1992-2002, were followed from birth and until either the date of first diagnosis recording, death, emigration, 16th birthday or administrative censoring (17 May 2017), whichever came first. The number of incident JIA…
Three-Year Intervention Effects on Food and Beverage Intake—Results from the Quasi-Experimental Copenhagen School Child Intervention Study (CoSCIS)
The diet of Danish children is often not in accordance with dietary guidelines. We aimed to evaluate changes in the intake of selected foods and beverages during a multi-component school-based physical activity intervention, and to investigate if changes were modified by socioeconomic status (SES). The study included 307 children (intervention group: 184; comparison group: 123) with information on dietary intake pre- and post-intervention as well…
Vitamin D and Calcium Milk Fortification in Pregnant Women with Periodontitis: A Feasibility Trial
This study aims to assess the acceptability, adherence, and retention of a feasibility trial on milk fortification with calcium and vitamin D (Ca+VitD) and periodontal therapy (PT) among low income Brazilian pregnant women with periodontitis (IMPROVE trial). This 2 × 2 factorial feasibility trial used a mixed-methods evaluation. In total, 69 pregnant women were randomly allocated to four groups: 1. fortified sachet with Ca+VitD and milk plus earl…
Changes in job strain and subsequent weight gain: A longitudinal study, based on the Danish Nurse Cohort
Objective Obesity as well as job strain is increasing, and job strain might contribute to weight gain. The objective of the current study was to examine associations between longitudinal alterations in the components of job strain and subsequent weight gain. Design The study was designed as a prospective cohort study with three questionnaire surveys enabling measurement of job-strain alterations over 6 years and subsequent measurements of weight …
Exposure to vitamin D from fortified margarine during fetal life and later risk of pre-eclampsia: The D-tect Study
Objective T o examine if fetal exposure to a small dosage of extra vitamin D from food fortification was associated with a decrease in the risk of pre-eclampsia later in life. Design Cancellation of the mandatory vitamin D fortification of margarine in 1985 created a societal experiment, with entire adjacent birth cohorts exposed or unexposed to extra vitamin D during fetal development. The Danish national medical health registries allowed the id…
Cross-sectional associations between maternal self-efficacy and dietary intake and physical activity in four-year-old children of first-time Swedish mothers
The complexity of self-regulating food intake in weight loss maintenance. A qualitative study among short- and long-term weight loss maintainers
The contribution of this study is a more comprehensive view on food intake as an outcome of a set of complex behaviours, revealing insights into the differences in cognitions and strategies applied to the task of WLM, between short- and long-term maintainers
Physical activity, obesity and mortality: Does pattern of physical activity have stronger epidemiological associations
PA patterns demonstrated a stronger association with a number of anthropometric and mortality outcomes than the single time-point measures. Operationalising PA as a sustained behavioural pattern may address some of the known under-estimation of risk for poor health in PA self-report measurements and better reflect exposure for epidemiological analysis of risk of health outcomes
Effects of the Healthy Start randomized intervention on dietary intake among obesity-prone normal-weight children
Objective The study aimed to evaluate the impact of a 15-month intervention on dietary intake conducted among obesity-prone normal-weight pre-school children. Design Information on dietary intake was obtained using a 4 d diet record. A diet quality index was adapted to assess how well children’s diet complied with the Danish national guidelines. Linear regression per protocol and intention-to-treat analyses of differences in intakes of energy, ma…
Calcium, vitamin D, casein and whey protein intakes and periodontitis among Danish adults
Objective To investigate whether intakes of Ca, vitamin D, casein and whey are associated with periodontitis and to investigate the possibility of interactions between them. Design Cross-sectional study. An Internet-based, 267-item FFQ was used to assess dietary intake. Intakes of casein (32·0 g/d), whey proteins (9·6 g/d) and vitamin D (5·8 μg/d) were classified as within v. above the 50th percentile. Ca intake was classified as within v. below …
Sugar-sweetened beverages, vascular risk factors and events: A systematic literature review
Objective A high intake of sugar-sweetened beverages (SSB) has been linked to weight gain, obesity and type 2 diabetes; however, the influence on CVD risk remains unclear. Therefore, our objective was to summarize current evidence for an association between SSB consumption and cardiovascular risk factors and events. Design The article search was performed in August 2013. Two independent researchers performed the article search and selection, data…
Missing portion sizes in FFQ – alternatives to use of standard portions
Objective Standard portions or substitution of missing portion sizes with medians may generate bias when quantifying the dietary intake from FFQ. The present study compared four different methods to include portion sizes in FFQ. Design We evaluated three stochastic methods for imputation of portion sizes based on information about anthropometry, sex, physical activity and age. Energy intakes computed with standard portion sizes, defined as sex-sp…
Primary prevention of childhood obesity through counselling sessions at Swedish child health centres: Design, methods and baseline sample characteristics of the PRIMROSE cluster-randomised trial
ISRCTN16991919
Smoking and Risk of Coronary Heart Disease in Younger, Middle-Aged, and Older Adults
Objectives. We investigated associations of smoking and coronary heart disease (CHD) by age. Methods. Data came from the Pooling Project on Diet and Coronary Heart Disease (8 prospective studies, 1974–1996; n = 192 067 women and 74 720 men, aged 40–89 years). Results. During follow-up, 4326 cases of CHD were reported. Relative to never smokers, CHD risk among current smokers was highest in the youngest and lowest in the oldest participants. For e…
Effectiveness of the Gold Standard Programmes (GSP) for Smoking Cessation in Pregnant and Non-Pregnant Women
The GSP seems to be as effective among pregnant smokers as among non-pregnant smoking women. Due to the relatively high effect and clinical significance, the GSP would be an attractive element in smoking cessation intervention among pregnant women
Cross-sectional associations between maternal self-efficacy and dietary intake and physical activity in four-year-old children of first-time Swedish mothers
Exploratory analysis of reflective, reactive, and homeostatic eating behaviour traits on weight change during the 18-month NoHoW weight maintenance trial
Behaviour change interventions for weight management have found varied effect sizes and frequent weight re-gain after weight loss. There is interest in exploring whether differences in eating behaviour can be used to develop tailored weight management programs. This secondary analysis of an 18-month weight maintenance randomised controlled trial (RCT) aimed to investigate the association between individual variability in weight maintenance succes…
Dietary underreporting by obese individuals--is it specific or non-specific?
Objective : To examine the distribution of patterns of macronutrient density in relation to obesity. Design : Cross sectional. Setting : Denmark. Subjects : 323 men and women aged 35-65 years, selected randomly from a larger population sample of Danish adults. Main outcome measure : Bias in dietary reporting of energy and protein intake in relation to percentage body fat, assessed by comparison of data from an interview on dietary intake with dat…
Food patterns, flour fortification, and intakes of calcium and vitamin D: A longitudinal study of Danish adults
STUDY OBJECTIVE: Deficiencies in calcium and vitamin D intakes are involved in the aetiology of osteoporosis, and health authorities recommend that the population consume a diet providing sufficient calcium and vitamin D. However, in 1987 the Danish Government withdrew a mandatory fortification of flour with calcium. This study examines intakes of calcium and vitamin D over time, in relation to food patterns, recommendations, and legislation. DES…
Bioelectrical impedance analysis—part II: Utilization in clinical practice
Large heterogeneity of the obesity epidemic in Danish adults
Objective: To examine to what extent the obesity epidemic is a general phenomenon in adults by assessing the secular change, by birth cohort and age, in the prevalence of obesity and median body mass index (BMI) in Danish men and women measured between 1964 and 1994. Design: Multiple cross-sectional population surveys. Setting: The greater Copenhagen area of Denmark. Subjects: The study included 17 065 men (30 336 observations) and 13 417 women (…
Changes in body water distribution during treatment with inhaled steroid in pre-school children
Decreased growth during inhaled steroid treatment seems to partly reflect generalized changes in body water
Can adverse effects of dietary fat intake be overestimated as a consequence of dietary fat underreporting
Objective To describe the consequences of systematic reporting bias by the obese for diet–disease relationships. Design The present report used 24-hour urinary nitrogen and estimates of 24-hour energy expenditure to assess error in diet reporting, and examined the consequence of accounting for this error for associations between dietary fat intake and serum low-density lipoprotein (LDL)-cholesterol. Setting Sub-study to the Danish MONICA (Monitor…
Glycaemic index and glycaemic load in relation to blood lipids – 6 years of follow-up in adult Danish men and women
Background Cross-sectional studies have suggested an association between glycaemic index (GI) or glycaemic load (GL) and serum lipids. However, no prospective studies have been performed. Objective To examine whether GI or GL was associated with subsequent changes in serum lipids. Design Prospective study with 6 years of follow-up. Overall dietary GI and GL of each participant were assessed from diet history interviews. Setting Population-based s…
Association between dietary arginine and lysine intake and 6 years change in body composition among 9-year-old children (Eyhs)
Meals and snacks from the child’s perspective: The contribution of qualitative methods to the development of dietary interventions
Objective To explore the everyday consumption of meals and snacks from the child’s perspective, among those with healthier v . less healthy dietary habits. Design The sample in this qualitative study comprised two groups of Danish schoolchildren aged 10 to 11 years, one with a healthier diet ( n 9) and the other with a less healthy diet ( n 8). Both groups were recruited from respondents to a dietary survey. Semi-structured interviews took their …
Association between intake of dietary protein and 3-year-change in body growth among normal and overweight 6-year-old boys and girls (CoSCIS)
Objective Growth hormone (GH) affects linear growth and body composition, by increasing the secretion of insulin-like growth factor-I (IGF-I), muscle protein synthesis and lipolysis. The intake of protein (PROT) as well as the specific amino acids arginine (ARG) and lysine (LYS) stimulates GH/IGF-I secretion. The present paper aimed to investigate associations between PROT intake as well as intake of the specific amino acids ARG and LYS, and subs…
Dietary carbohydrates and change in physical performance of elderly Europeans: Survey in Europe on Nutrition and the Elderly, a Concerted Action (Seneca) 1993 and 1999
Objective To study dietary glycaemic index (GI) and glycaemic load (GL) in association with physical performance in elderly Europeans. Design Cross-sectional and prospective study. Physical performance was measured using the Physical Performance Test (PPT) score on a scale from 0 to 27, where high scores indicate a better physical performance. Habitual diets were measured using diet history interviews and dietary GI and GL were estimated from tab…
Intake of total dietary sugar and fibre is associated with insulin resistance among Danish 8–10- and 14–16-year-old girls but not boys. European Youth Heart Studies I and II
Objective To examine the dietary intake of total sugar, added sugar, non-added sugar and starch as well as dietary fibre and glycaemic index (GI) and their respective associations with insulin resistance. Design Mixed linear models were used to study both cross-sectional and prospective associations between carbohydrate components and insulin resistance separately in girls and boys. Diet was assessed by a single 24 h recall interview and insulin …
Television viewing, food preferences, and food habits among children: A prospective epidemiological study
Long time spent on TV viewing, and possibly to a lesser degree, frequent consumption of meals during TV viewing, seem to be associated with generally having unhealthy food preferences and food habits among school-aged children. These associations, however, were not generally persistent after 6 years of follow-up
P1-487 Combined influence of physical activity and Hip circumference on all-cause mortality
Introduction Hip circumference has been shown to be inversely associated with mortality. Reduced femoral fat or muscle atrophy in the gluteofemoral region in those with narrow hips has been proposed as explanations and thus, physical activity is likely to play an important role. The aim was to estimate the combined effects of hip circumference and leisure-time physical activity on all-cause mortality. Methods We used a prospective population desi…
The Healthy Start project: A randomized, controlled intervention to prevent overweight among normal weight, preschool children at high risk of future overweight
If the Healthy Start project is effective in preventing excessive weight gain, it will provide valuable information on new determinants of obesity which should be considered in future interventions, and on new strategies to prevent development of overweight and obesity at an early age
The Gold Standard Programme: Smoking cessation interventions for disadvantaged smokers are effective in a real-life setting
Although continuous abstinence was lower among disadvantaged smokers, the absolute difference was small. If the programme had been as effective in disadvantaged as in non-disadvantaged groups, there would have been an extra 46 or 8 quitters annually, respectively. Promoting individual interventions among those with a low education may increase the effectiveness of GSP
Effectiveness of the Gold Standard Programmes (GSP) for Smoking Cessation in Pregnant and Non-Pregnant Women
The GSP seems to be as effective among pregnant smokers as among non-pregnant smoking women. Due to the relatively high effect and clinical significance, the GSP would be an attractive element in smoking cessation intervention among pregnant women
Gold Standard Program for Heavy Smokers in a Real-Life Setting
Abstinence after GSP was 1-6% lower in the heavy smokers than in the overall study population. Modifiable factors may be used for small improvements in continued abstinence. However attempts to improve compliance seemed especially promising
The influence of early exposure to vitamin D for development of diseases later in life
The results of the study will contribute to our current understanding of the significance of supplementation with vitamin D. More specifically, they will enable new research in related fields, including interventional research designed to assess supplementation needs for different subgroups of pregnant women. Also, other health outcomes can subsequently be studied to generate multiple health research opportunities involving vitamin D. Finally, th…
Primary prevention of childhood obesity through counselling sessions at Swedish child health centres: Design, methods and baseline sample characteristics of the PRIMROSE cluster-randomised trial
ISRCTN16991919
Smoking and Risk of Coronary Heart Disease in Younger, Middle-Aged, and Older Adults
Objectives. We investigated associations of smoking and coronary heart disease (CHD) by age. Methods. Data came from the Pooling Project on Diet and Coronary Heart Disease (8 prospective studies, 1974–1996; n = 192 067 women and 74 720 men, aged 40–89 years). Results. During follow-up, 4326 cases of CHD were reported. Relative to never smokers, CHD risk among current smokers was highest in the youngest and lowest in the oldest participants. For e…
Sugar-sweetened beverages, vascular risk factors and events: A systematic literature review
Objective A high intake of sugar-sweetened beverages (SSB) has been linked to weight gain, obesity and type 2 diabetes; however, the influence on CVD risk remains unclear. Therefore, our objective was to summarize current evidence for an association between SSB consumption and cardiovascular risk factors and events. Design The article search was performed in August 2013. Two independent researchers performed the article search and selection, data…
Missing portion sizes in FFQ – alternatives to use of standard portions
Objective Standard portions or substitution of missing portion sizes with medians may generate bias when quantifying the dietary intake from FFQ. The present study compared four different methods to include portion sizes in FFQ. Design We evaluated three stochastic methods for imputation of portion sizes based on information about anthropometry, sex, physical activity and age. Energy intakes computed with standard portion sizes, defined as sex-sp…
Calcium, vitamin D, casein and whey protein intakes and periodontitis among Danish adults
Objective To investigate whether intakes of Ca, vitamin D, casein and whey are associated with periodontitis and to investigate the possibility of interactions between them. Design Cross-sectional study. An Internet-based, 267-item FFQ was used to assess dietary intake. Intakes of casein (32·0 g/d), whey proteins (9·6 g/d) and vitamin D (5·8 μg/d) were classified as within v. above the 50th percentile. Ca intake was classified as within v. below …
Physical activity, obesity and mortality: Does pattern of physical activity have stronger epidemiological associations
PA patterns demonstrated a stronger association with a number of anthropometric and mortality outcomes than the single time-point measures. Operationalising PA as a sustained behavioural pattern may address some of the known under-estimation of risk for poor health in PA self-report measurements and better reflect exposure for epidemiological analysis of risk of health outcomes
Medicine (41 works) · Internal Medicine (26 works) · Environmental health (24 works) · Obesity, Physical Activity, Diet (21 works) · Obesity (16 works) · Demography (14 works) · Psychology (13 works) · Endocrinology (11 works) · Gerontology (11 works) · Danish (10 works)