Maternal smoking and congenital malformations: an epidemiological study

Abstract

In a case-control study undertaken in several hospitals in Connecticut, it was found that women who reported smoking more than 20 cigarettes a day during pregnancy had a relative risk of about 1.6 for congenital malformations in the offspring of that pregnancy compared with women who said they had not smoked at all during pregnancy. However, there was no significant increase in risk among women who reported smoking 20 or fewer cigarettes a day during pregnancy compared with those who said they had not smoked at all during pregnancy. The higher risk among moderate and heavy smokers could not be attributed to any of the potentially confounding variables considered in this study; furthermore, it was specific to smoking during pregnancy rather than before pregnancy, and increased with the average amount smoked a day. Nevertheless, because the increase in risk was modest, because response bias could exist in a study of this type, and because no other studies have examined in detail the smoking-congenital malformation hypothesis, further research is needed to determine whether the relationship between maternal smoking and congenital malformations in offspring is causal.