Effectiveness of Exercises in Glycaemic Control and Maternal Outcome among Women with Gestational Diabetes Mellitus- A Pilot study

Introduction: Diabetes Mellitus is a common medical problem that is very often seen in pregnancy in the present era. Pregnant women should keep in mind their health and lifestyle considerations or else pregnancy will end up with many complications. Pre-existing factors and pregnancy factors will be contributing and make pregnancy more complicated. Exercises are recommended as a healthy practice which prevents many diseases and provides a healthy life. Aim: To evaluate the glycaemic level by focusing on exercises to improve the maternal outcome. Materials and Methods: A Pilot study with Quasi-experimental pre-post control group design with 30 Gestational Diabetes Mellitus (GDM) women (15 in each group) were selected who met the inclusion and exclusion criteria. The study was conducted in tertiary care Hospital between June 2019 and December 2019. Based on the convenience sampling technique, the setting was selected and a simple random technique was adopted to select the subjects. The 15 subjects were included in each groups, both intervention and control group. Exercises were taught for the interventional group of women for 12 weeks. Regular treatment was continued for both groups which include medication, diet and regular walking. Pre-test and post-test glycaemic scores were done for both the groups. Mann-whitney test, ANOVA, post-hoc test, paired Eta square were also used and IBM Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) version 23.0 was used. Results: The study shows there was a significant difference in the pre-Fasting Blood Sugar (FBS) and post FBS values in the intervention group p-value <0.027. The paired Eta square value was 0.303 which showed a moderate effect of the exercise on the glycaemic value in the interventional group. There was a significant difference in the pre glycosylated haemoglobin (HbA1c) and post HbA1c values in both the intervention and control group was p-value <0.023 and p-value <0.025, respectively. The maternal outcome shows increased severity of the complications in the control group while comparing with the intervention group such as pre-eclampsia, operative interference, and preterm deliveries. But there was no significant difference in the maternal outcome observed between intervention and control group p-value >0.05. Conclusion: Regular moderate-intensity aerobic and resistance exercise training during pregnancy is associated with lower blood glucose level. Thus, study concluded that exercise has a moderate effect on glycaemic control.