St George's leads study into helping pregnant women stop smoking

EXPERTS worldwide are keen to solve the problem of mothers-to-be who smoke during and after their baby is born. Now a team at St George’s is planning one of the biggest studies of its kind on smoking cessation in pregnancy, with funding from both sides of the Atlantic.

Health psychology lecturer Dr Michael Ussher and colleagues have won a £1.1m grant from the British government’s Health Technology Assessment programme to examine whether regular, supervised exercise can help pregnant women stop smoking.

An additional £350,000 funding has come from the prestigious National Institute of Health in the United States.

The team now hopes to extend the study to determine whether not only exercise but also extended contact time with health professionals is a factor in helping women quit.

Most smokers know the risks they run. But, around 17 per cent of pregnant women admit to smoking throughout their pregnancy — often in secret because they fear disapproval.

“Smoking in pregnancy is a big public health issue, and the success rates are still really low,” says Dr Ussher, who is author of the Cochrane Review on exercise interventions in smoking cessation.

“More women try to stop smoking in pregnancy than at any other time, so this is a good opportunity for intervention.”

The two-and-a-half year trial, to involve at least 800 pregnant women, will begin this autumn 2008 at hospitals in London and Surrey. Smokers will be offered a series of half-hour sessions with a midwife at which they will be able to exercise on a treadmill or exercise bike, while watching either TV or health education videos.

Their smoking status will be checked by saliva swab around the time of delivery, and again six months later.

All successful smoking interventions, such as nicotine replacement, target cravings, says Michael.

“Because nicotine is harmful to the fetus a lot of women don’t want to use it. We have found that exercise works as well as anything else at reducing cravings.”

If the trial is successful, the NHS could be able to implement the intervention at low cost — good news not only for the health of thousands of mothers, but for future generations.

Women in America could benefit from this study also. Among Michael’s American collaborators are Professor Bess Marcus of Brown University, who is a leading US government adviser.