Conclusions and Recommendations Interventions which include advice, multiple components, behavioral strategies, support, multiple contacts, and self-help manuals are effective in significantly decreasing tobacco smoking in pregnant women. Interventions work with diverse populations with different levels of nicotine dependence and at different stages of gestation. Decrease in tobacco use has a beneficial effect on increasing average birth weight and decreasing the incidence of low birth weight infants. Smoking cessation interventions are cost effective as a result of decreasing the number of low birth weight infants. Cognitive ability is also improved in children of mothers who did not smoke during gestation.
More research is needed on interventions to maintain abstinence post-delivery.
Prevention, Health Promotion, Addiction Research Foundation, M. Pope, and reference sections from articles. Acknowledgements Funding for this report was provided by Health Canada under the Government of Canada's Brighter Futures Initiatives. The Task Force thanks Helen P. Batty, MD, CCFP, MEd, FCFP, Associate Professor, Department of Family and Community Medicine, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario and Douglas M.C. Wilson, MD, CCFP, FCFP, Professor of Family Medicine, McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario for reviewing the draft report. Full Citation Moner S.E. Smoking and pregnancy. Canadian Guide to Clinical Preventive Health Care .