[Drugs and pregnancy: A survey of 374 women in France]

Abstract

Objectives: The objectives of this study were to describe drug use during pregnancy in a context of acute and chronic diseases during pregnancy. An additional aim was to analyze the maternal socio-demographic and lifestyle factors associated with medication use in pregnancy.

Methods: Cross-sectional, web-based descriptive study conducted among French women using a 33-item web-based questionnaire. Multiple logistic regression analyzes were performed to assess the association between socio-demographic/lifestyle factors and medication use in pregnancy.

Results: A total of 374 women completed the questionnaire. Of these, 75.1% (n=280) and 12.6% (n=47) used medication for treatment for acute and chronic diseases, respectively. A total of 68.9% (n=258) of women surveyed have deliberately avoided taking non-prescribed drugs when they were pregnant. Non-users of folic acid were less often taking medications (78.9%) than folic acid users (89.5%) OR=0.44 [0.24; 0.79].

Conclusion: More than eight out of ten women have taken medication during pregnancy especially analgesics. The maternal socio-demographic and lifestyle factors do not seem to impact on the use of medication during pregnancy.

Keywords: Drugs; Enquête; France; Grossesse; Médicaments; Pregnancy; Survey.