Is It Ok To Drink Ensure While Pregnant?
More than anybody else, pregnant women require more nutrients. Pregnant women will give all of the nutrients they ingest to their unborn child before taking whatever is left over for themselves.
Because of this, it’s crucial to ensure that you obtain all the nourishment you require when you’re pregnant. Healthy beverages like Ensure can assist you in achieving this!
Is Drinking Ensure Safe While Pregnant?
Many different types of nourishment supplements are made by the business Abbott under the brand name Ensure. They produce rehydration beverages, balanced nutrition bars, and protein shake powder in addition to their protein shake, which is perhaps their best-known product.
All Ensure products are advertised as foods, which is a blessing for Ensure drinkers everywhere. Thus, each component has received FDA approval for food safety. This implies that using Ensure while pregnant is safe.
Their usage in hospitals is additional, albeit anecdotal, proof of their safety. Long used in medical settings, Ensure is a brand that is requested for patients who are unable to consume enough food throughout the day.
Every Ensure shake, no matter the flavor, contains certain vitamins and minerals. These additional nutrients can be a significant assistance for women who are unable to eat enough during the day (for example, due to severe morning sickness), especially because several vitamins and minerals are required in larger amounts during pregnancy.
The Advantages Of Drinking Ensure
Ensure is comparable to a meal on the go. You can consume one as you leave the house if you don’t have time for breakfast. Drinking Ensure helps you:
1. Assist in Meeting Daily Calorie Needs
The recommended daily calorie intake for women who aren’t pregnant is 2000. It is advised to boost your calorie intake by 300 calories when pregnant.
You should boost your daily caloric intake by 600 calories if you’re expecting twins. This may not appear to be much, but it may be when you eat healthier. Reaching your objective is made simpler by the high-calorie content of a typical McDonald’s meal, which is on the unhealthy side.
These meals do not, however, contain the nutrients you require. Without dressing, a chef’s salad normally has close to 400 calories. So even if you only consume a chef’s salad for lunch, you still have 1900 calories to burn.
Snacking throughout the day seems to be essential for eating healthily and getting your daily calorie needs. The majority of women either find it difficult to accomplish this or have occupations that prevent it.
Ensure steps are in at this point. 350 calories in a typical Ensure might help you reach your daily need.
2. Maintain Nutritional Needs During Pregnancy
Your daily complete nutrition needs may often be met with a balanced diet and prenatal vitamins. Some ladies, though, might not be able to make it happen.
For instance, you miss out on the nutrients in that category of foods if you are unable to consume the complete meal. Unexpectedly frequently, iron deficits occur during pregnancy!
On average, one Ensure beverage provides 25% of the daily recommended iron intake. You may get your recommended daily intake of iron if you consume two glasses each day along with an essential vitamin.
3. Combat Morning Sickness
When you’re sick all day with morning sickness, it’s difficult to eat healthily, if you can eat at all. Due to their inability to eat, the majority of women end up reducing their caloric intake during this period.
If this sounds familiar to you, talk to your doctor or health care provider about taking Ensure or an excellent source of nutrition drink that is similar to nutritional products to insure that you receive the right nourishment throughout the first trimester of your healthy pregnancy and seek their medical advice.
4. Help You Gain Weight
Some pregnant women find it challenging to gain weight. Instead, they begin to slim down. Normally, this balances out, but too much weight loss may be harmful to the healthy development of the baby. Drinking Ensure regularly can help pregnant women gain weight due to the calories available in it.
5. Support Immune System
Due to its 32 nutrients, drinking Ensure can promote immune system health. Simply because of this, Ensure beverages are excellent for boosting your immune system.
Vitamin A, Vitamin D, protein, Vitamin C, and Vitamin D in particular help to strengthen your immune system so that you may stay healthy and deliver a healthy child.
You’ll quickly learn that you can’t use a lot of over-the-counter drugs while you’re unwell and pregnant. It is therefore preferable to have the strongest immune system you can.
Considerations Before Consuming Ensure While Pregnant
Even while drinking Ensure during pregnancy has numerous advantages, there are a few concerns you should be aware of.
- Caffeine may be found in some Ensure products with coffee flavors. A moderate caffeine intake of no more than 200 mg per day is advised by ACOG. If you consume other beverages that contain caffeine, be careful to keep track of how much of it you take in daily.
- Dairy milk is a common ingredient in Ensure drinks. Choose a beverage containing plant-based protein if you have a dairy allergy or are vegan.
- The increased proper nutrition needs of a healthy pregnancy can be met by drinking Ensure in addition to a healthy diet. Ensure is a great food choice if morning sickness prevents you from eating.
- Ensure is not meant to assist pregnant women to lose weight during pregnancy and should not be substituted for normal meals.
- Ensure contains a lot of vitamins and minerals. There are occasions when having too much of one item might have negative repercussions. Congenital abnormalities and excessive vitamin A use have been connected. To find out how much Ensure is safe for you, you should see a doctor before consistently consuming it.
The Bottom Line
So is it okay to drink Ensure while pregnant? The answer is yes. Ensure doesn’t contain anything harmful to you or your unborn child. It does, however, contain a lot of calories that you might or might not need. Ensure isn’t especially harmful to you during your pregnancy.