• Catarina A Canivet, Per-Olof Ostergren, Iréne L Jakobsson, Elisabeth Dejin-Karlsson, and Barbro M Hagander.
• Division of General Practice, Department of Clinical Sciences Malmö, Lund University, Sweden. Catarina.canivet@med.lu.se
• Scand J Public Health. 2008 May 1; 36 (3): 284-91.

BackgroundMany parents seek help from health professionals because of their infants' persistent crying in the early months. The aetiology of this condition, often labelled ;;infantile colic'', is still unclear.AimsTo assess whether smoking during pregnancy, and/or smoking at infant age 5 weeks, is associated with infantile colic, and to describe how feeding at infant age 5 weeks and smoking are related to colic.MethodsThis was a community-based study, with telephone interviews in late pregnancy, and at infant age 5 weeks, covering 1,625 mother-infant dyads, i.e. 86% of the eligible population.ResultsDaily maternal smoking in pregnancy was related to subsequent colic, with an age-adjusted odds ratio (OR) of 1.74 (95% confidence interval 1.08-2.82). In the multivariate model, the OR was largely unaltered. The association between smoking at infant age 5 weeks and colic did not reach statistical significance. The subgroups based on smoking and infant feeding were small, but the results suggest that exclusive breast-feeding was protective against colic, including for infants of smoking mothers.ConclusionsThis study presents yet another argument why smoking in pregnancy should be discouraged - some cases of infantile colic may be avoided. With regard to mothers who are not able to give up smoking, the results add some support for the conclusion that if a mother is worried about colic, she certainly should not refrain from breast-feeding even if she smokes.

17 keywords...

hide…