Smoking and Breastfeeding: Guidelines and Information to Pregnant and Postpartum Women

Introduction: Several studies have shown that spontaneous abortions, premature births, low weight babies, deaths of fetuses and newborns, complications with the placenta and episodes of bleeding occur more often when a pregnant woman smokes. The nicotine enters the blood stream in 30 minutes, long enough to be passed to the baby while being breastfed by his smoker mother.

Objectives: This study aims to guide and inform pregnant and postpartum women about the consequences of smoking and breastfeeding.

Methods: A cross-sectional, randomized study conducted with pregnant and postpartum women hospitalized in rooming a hospital of Porto Alegre, Brazil, during the period from May to December 2013.

Results: Guidelines were given to 115 postpartum women with a mean age of 26.3 years and 26 pregnant women with a mean age of 30.2 years. Among the postpartum mothers, 13.91% reported having smoked at least once during pregnancy, and among pregnant women, 15.38% said the same.

Conclusion: With this study, we can conclude that, despite the information disseminated by society about the harms of tobacco, some people still use it. It is understood that this number of smokers among pregnant and postpartum women can be higher because some women feel embarrassed to talk on the subject. From this study, new ways of preventing the use of tobacco by pregnant women can be studied in order to decrease these numbers and to provide a smoother pregnancy, as well as a period of breastfeeding without risk to the baby.