How cigarette Affects the Pregnancy

This would surprise you to hear that, now-a-days it’s difficult to get the healthy baby, as everybody is drawn in to make their lifestyle as modernized. Though we need modernization in our life, we should restrict ourselves to lead healthier life. Many, at these days, are not taking care of their health. Our life style would affect our offspring’s health and growth. One such case is smoking during pregnancy.Cigarette smoking restrain harmful chemicals such as nicotine, carbon monoxide, hydrogen cyanide and other several carcinogens.In both, animals and human studies, nicotine has been noted to stimulate the release of body substance called catecholamine which in turn causes narrowing of the blood vessels to the uterus. As a result, there would be reduction in the oxygen concentration of the fetal circulation and causes the fetal distress.

Researchers now believe that this constriction of blood vessels in the uterus may permanently damage those blood vessels affecting the outcome of future pregnancies. And also, it is proved that smoking during pregnancy directly causes to have increased risk of her child developing cancer in future.Carbon monoxide is a poison found in significant concentrations in tobacco smoke. It easily crosses the placental barrier and has been detected in umbilical cord of infant of smoking mother and combines with hemoglobin in both the maternal and fetal blood stream to form carboxyhaemoglobin , which reduces the blood’s oxygen carrying capacity.

Scientists’ trepidation is that the carbon monoxide in cigarette smoke is more significant cause of permanent and disabling fetal growth retardation than in nicotin and any other pollutants.

Cigarette smoking is most responsible for a poor fetal outcome with smaller head circumference and body lengths less than 5.5 pounds which the doctors termed as “fetal tobacco syndrome”.

Unlike with non-smokers, several studies have conducted that smoking mothers are more likely to experience spontaneous abortions. Chances are more that, they give birth to infants with lower IQ score, congenital malformation, hyperactivity-reading-learning disorders, although whether some of these mental and physical inadequacies are permanent has not been established.

An Rh-ve women , who is deficient of Rh factor, may form anti bodies which destroy the red blood cells for her Rh+ve fetus .The destroyed RBC’s would not be able to carry adequate amount of oxygen to the fetal tissues. And carbon monoxide from inhaled cigarette smoke is believed to further impair this oxygen transport system.

The risk of the child’s contracting pneumonia and bronchitis during the 1st year of life is higher if its mother had smoking habitual during pregnancy.Placental maturation and aging occurs earlier in the pregnancies of smokers than non-smokers. You could see the placental maturation and aging in USG (Ultra Sound Scan). Smokers were also more likely to have areas of placental calcification often which is an indication of aging, structural defects and poor placental function.

The incidence of placental previa is reported to increase by 25% in moderate smokers and by 92% among heavy smokers.

Whether women is smoker or are exposed to the “side stream” or “second hand” smoke of others , cigarette smoking in the home or work environment will put their fetus in jeopardy. Carbon monoxide is one of the most dangerous pollutants found in cigarette smoke, but it is also produced by cars, trucks, furnaces and industrial machinery. Carbon monoxide concentration is heaviest in the air around metro cities.

Ø Laboratory researchers’ epidemiological studies and clinical experience suggests that cigarette may be risk of tubal pregnancies.

Ø WHO report on ectopic pregnancy concluded that smokers have a 2-4 times greater risk of tubal pregnancy than non-smokers.

Ø In one-laboratory study, researchers found that nicotine treated rats showed a delay in the implantation of the egg into the endometrium.Ø One surprising , unexplained and discouraging finding was that the risk of a tubal-pregnancy for a women who had stopped smoking before conception was still 1.6 times greater than for women who had never smoked.

Ø Cigarette smoking may cause reduced immunity in the cells lining the fallopian tubes. This in turn predisposes smokers to tubal infection and PID, two conditions which can inhibit normal tubal passage of the fertilized egg.

Ø Researchers also reported that passive smoking was associated with lower infant birth weights.

Ø Elevated levels of cotinine , the chief metabolite of nicotine , were found in samples of blood drawn from these woman during 2nd trimester.

Ø Thiocyanate is a metabolic byproduct of tobacco smoke found elevated levels in umbilical cord blood vessels of new born whose non-smoking mother were exposed to cigarette smoke throughout pregnancy.

If a pregnant woman smokes, she has to face the issues discussed above and be guilty of making budding fetus lethal.So, the underline of the topic is “Smoking Is Injurious To Health”, Not just of those who smokes but also to their neighbors, irrespective of whether they are male or female. In case of pregnant female, it affects two lives at a time.

#Ayurveda #Pregnancy #Smoking

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