Prevalence and factors associated with alcohol consumption during pregnancy

Abstract

Objectives: to investigate the prevalence of alcohol consumption during pregnancy and its sociodemographic, reproductive and newborn-related factors. Methods: a cross-sectional and exploratory study carried out on a sample of post-partum women, recruited daily over six months. Sociodemographic and reproductive information about the women and data concerning the newborns were collected. T-ACE questionnaire was used to identify the pattern of alcohol consumption by the women. They were divided into two groups: alcohol consumers (T-ACE score ≥2) and non-alcohol consumers. Comparisons between the two groups were made using the unpaired t test, chi-square test or Fisher's exact test according to the type of variable analyzed. The significance level was set at 5%. Results: out of 925 women, 818 (88.4%) agreed to participate. Among them, 60 (7.3%) were T-ACE positive, i.e. identified as alcohol consumers. Regarding the sociodemographic information, alcohol consumption was more frequent among women who did not have a steady partner (p=0.010). No reproductive variable presented a significant difference between the groups. A lower weight was observed among children of T-ACE positive mothers (3,045g±71.0 vs 3,192g±19.2; p=0.040). Conclusions: identifying and characterizing women who are more susceptible to alcohol consumption during pregnancy can contribute to developing more effective public health intervention strategies.