Maternal Risk Factors for Fetal Alcohol Syndrome in the Western Cape Province of South Africa: A Population-Based Study

Abstract

Preventive interventions are needed to address maternal risk factors for FAS.

Predictors of risk of alcohol-exposed pregnancies among women in an urban and a rural area of South Africa

“…In general, the factors associated with AEP risk in the present study are consistent with the maternal risk factors for FAS identified in previous studies in the Western and Northern Cape Provinces (May et al, 2005(May et al, , 2008Urban et al, 2008;Viljoen et al, 2002). However, parity was associated with lower risk of an AEP in this survey, but is usually associated with greater risk of having a child with an FASD.…”

“…However, our assurances to the participants of the confidentiality of their responses and our exclusion of names on the questionnaires increase our confidence in the findings. Moreover, investigators of studies of similar South African communities have indicated their impressions that women are not inclined to under-report their alcohol use (e.g., May et al, 2005). Fifth, although findings regarding the Level 3 outcome would provide the greatest insight into the risk of actually having a child with FAS, our relatively small sample size precluded the execution of multivariate analyses for the urban site.…”

“…Maternal risk factors for FAS have been investigated in the Western and Northern Cape provinces (May et al, 2005(May et al, , 2008Urban et al, 2008;Viljoen, Croxford, Gossage, Kodituwakku, & May, 2002). The risk factors identified by those studies include: (1) demographic characteristics (e.g., education, occupation/employment, income, marital status at index pregnancy); (2) alcohol consumption patterns (e.g., current drinking, age of onset of drinking); (3) tobacco use behaviours (e.g., tobacco use during pregnancy); (4) partners' and family members' characteristics (e.g., partner drinking, heavy drinking by family members); (5) alcohol consumption prior to and during each month of the past pregnancy; (6) reproductive health history (e.g., parity, gravidity, birth order of index child, stillbirth); (7) physical characteristics (e.g., height, weight and body mass index; BMI).…”

Consecuencias de la exposición prenatal al alcohol: desarrollo histórico de la investigación y evolución de las recomendaciones

“…Esto se explica, en parte, por el hecho de que los estudios de determinación activa de casos han sido realizados, en su mayoría, en poblaciones o grupos de alto riesgo (39). Entre los factores de riesgo maternos han sido señalados: estatus socioeconómico y nivel educativo bajos; nutrición pobre, menor altura y peso y menor masa corporal; edad avanzada y alto número de embarazos y partos (40,41).…”

The role of prenatal alcohol exposure in abruptio placentae

“…Although abruptio placentae is associated with many risk factors, such as cigarette smoking, growth restriction, hypertension and pre-eclampsia, 2,3 a local study showed that 60% of 70 multigravidas who had had intrauterine deaths due to placental abruption had unremarkable previous obstetric histories. 4 A high prevalence of cigarette smoking 5 and consumption of alcohol during pregnancy 6 have been noted in the coloured population, in which abruptio placentae is the main cause of stillbirth.…”