Posted on 31st Dec 2011 @ 11:40 AM

Babies at greater risk from smoking

Doctors are urging mothers-to-be to stop smoking.

 Mothers who smoke while expecting a baby increase the risk of their child being born with a serious malformation by as much as 50%, a recent study found. The findings led to calls for new measures, including screening, to reduce what the authors called "staggeringly high" levels of smoking among pregnant women.

Smoking in pregnancy is already a serious risk and can  lead to babies suffering birth defects such as clubfoot, missing limbs and deformed limbs.  Although smoking has already been linked to a higher risks of a miscarriage or a baby being born prematurely or having a low birth weight, 45% of women under 20 do so while one in seven is still a smoker when she gives birth.  The researchers from University College London said their paper was "the first comprehensive review to identify the specific birth defects most associated with smoking." 

They reviewed 172 research papers published in the past 51 years covering 174,000 cases of birth defects. They concluded that for women who smoke while pregnant "the risk was increased by 26% for having a baby with missing or deformed limbs, 28% for clubfoot, 27% for gastrointestinal defects, 33% for skull defects, 25% for eye defects and 28% for cleft lip/palate."

The nicoscreen® smoking test can detect even small amounts of nicotine in the body.