Risk Behaviour ofParents in the Time of Expectation ofChild and after the Child Birth

Overview

The work presents trends of changes in consumption of alcohol and smoking which occured during the last two months of pregnancy and conflnement in women and men observed in the frame of international longitudinal prospective study ELSPAC. Respondents were filling the questionnaires which, within the ELSPAC set, were marked N4 (for women) and N5 (for men). Statements were not objectively verifled by laboratory investigation of biomarkers of exposition to cigarette smoke.In the set of 4983 women, the prevalence of smokers in the second half of pregnancy decreased from 8.2 % (in 20th week) to 7.0 % in 36. - 40. weeks of gravidity. 2.4 % of women who did not smoke at the end of the pregnancy, started to smoke after the delivery. On the contrary, 36 % of women who smoked during the whole pregnancy gave up smoking after the delivery. Women are bringing their habits in alcohol consumption from the pregnancy also to the time after the delivery: almost 86 % of women who did not drink in pregnancy, had not been drinking also after the delivery. Occasional and regular alcohol consumption - at least once a week - had been admitted by 78 % of mothers who gave similar frequency also at the end of their pregnancy. Daily consumption of alcohol was given by 84% of those women who were drinking alcohol daily also during the pregnancy. The other women described drinking of alcoholic drinks in weekly frequency, respective occasionally. Only one woman from the group of daily consumpting women and one fifth of the group of occasional or regular consumers did not drink after the delivery. The smokers drank alcoholic drinks significantly more often than non smoking women. Men did not change significantly their smoking habits neither during the time of expecting the baby, nor after the delivery. The regular consumption of alcohol drinks significantly increased after the birth of the child on the groups of non smokers.The results can serve as appeal to speciál health workers providing the care for the mother and child, to pay increased attention to the most important primary preventivě risks for the human reproduction - alcohol and smoking.

Key words:
smoking, alcohol, pregnancy, child birth.