Abstract
Smoking affects women’s health and increases their risk for some diseases. Women who smoke have problems with the reproductive system, and if women are pregnant have a high risk for fetal, and neonatal problems and consequences on their health. Quitting smoking at any time during pregnancy improves the condition of mother and baby. This study aims to identify the level of knowledge women have about smoking and effects on pregnancy aged between 1545 years. This study is cross-sectional and was implemented for the period of August-November 2021 was conducted at UHOG “Queen Geraldine” Tirana, Albania. The survey included 200 pregnant women, who agreed to complete the questionnaire. Data were coded and elaborated using IBM SPSS Statistics 26 software. Descriptive results on each question, comparison between important topics, and binary logistic regression for the five final questions were performed. Nevertheless, 30% of the total women in the study were smokers, 16% of them were pregnant smokers, and 14% were smokers before pregnancy. The women who continued to smoke were from urban areas, we do not have heavy smokers, and only 2.9% of them smoked >10 cigarettes a day. Women with secondary education report that the chance of ectopic pregnancy from smoking increases OR = 0.73. As the weeks of pregnancy pass, the likelihood of discovering that smoking increases the risk of having a baby with birth defects (OR = 0.78) increases. There were women in the first pregnancy and younger age groups that represented the highest level of knowledge related to the birth of an underweight baby because of smoking p = 0.003. In 31.6% of cases, the cessation of smoking had come because of the nursing counseling that they had received in the primary service. The trend of smoking among Albanian women is growing and information on the consequences of smoking is a necessity for a healthy population in the future. Women who smoke need assistance and counseling to quit smoking before becoming pregnant. The role of health care professionals in informing women about the risks of smoking to the baby and the mother should be expanded.
Keywords: pregnancy, knowledge, smoking, smoking cessation, counseling