Background: Maternal tobacco smoking during pregnancy is associated with adverse health effects for the woman, fetus, and child, including such serious effects as preterm birth, low birth weight, stillbirth, and neonatal and sudden infant death. Smoking cessation during pregnancy reduces health risks.
Purpose: In order to support pregnant women to quit smoking, it is essential to know determinants of quitting smoking in pregnancy. The purpose of this research was to examine women's understanding of maternal smoking, in terms of their beliefs, in relation to quitting smoking during pregnancy.
Methods: The study was a cross-sectional survey with anonymous questionnaires. The sample consisted of 161 pregnant and postnatal women who were continuing or had continued to smoke during pregnancy or had quit smoking during pregnancy. Logistic regression was used to determine the impact of women's understanding of maternal smoking on quitting smoking in pregnancy.
Results: A large majority of the women had low to moderate understanding of maternal smoking. Those with higher levels of understanding were more likely to quit smoking during pregnancy than were those with a low level of understanding. Not having children prior to the current pregnancy or childbirth also increased the likelihood of quitting smoking during pregnancy while being without a partner combined with having a longer duration of smoking decreased the likelihood of quitting smoking during pregnancy.
Conclusion: As a modifiable factor, pregnant women's understanding of maternal smoking can be readily targeted with informational interventions in an effort to help them quit smoking.
Keywords: Tobacco; pregnancy; quantitative design; smoking; smoking cessation; understanding.