To have one small glass of red wine at 38 weeks pregnant?

[baby2c]

I’m not a drinker at all but DH gets a bottle of red once or twice a month and tonight I really fancy just a very small glass, I’m a weirdo (according to DH) who likes ice in red wine on the rare occasion I have it. DH is only having one glass just in case I was to go into labour and he had to drive to hospital. So I was thinking of having a tiny amount with some ice and enjoying sipping it whilst watching tv in my pjs however I’m not sure if this is totally out of order or reasonable? Would you? Or did you? I haven’t touched alcohol at all since finding out I am pregnant at 4 weeks.

That about sums it up yeah.

You misunderstand me.

This approach doesn't require anyone to remember anything. You simply compare outcomes for when the guidance was 1-2 units (or whatever it was) and when the guidance was zero units.

Of course not everyone would behave exactly in line with the guidance, but at a population level, you'd expect to see clear patterns, if it made a significant difference.

Sounds like a good first approach. I haven't looked but if there's really a lack of research in this area, there's a PhD in it for someone.

How do you know what percentage of mothers take any notice of the guidance? How much notice do they take? What was their actual alcohol intake over the course of the pregnancy? How do you decide how much notice they took - because self-reported compliance is notoriously inaccurate.

What outcomes are you measuring? For small levels of alcoholic intake (and these are surely what we're interested in, because we know about the dangers of heavy drinking - they're already well documented), you'd be looking at small consequences. If you're looking for small yet significant changes you would need huge amounts of data. Looking for things like perhaps a 2 point drop in IQ; a one month developmental delay. These are things that probably arent measured now and even if they were would just be considered data noise within acceptable margin of error if it wasn't a huge study.

What are the risks?

Well if no one is taking any notice of guidelines at all then you wonder what's the point of them. That's its own conclusion.

You'd measure against multiple criteria.

So your premise for the research is that the guidelines are being adhered to? OK...

Do you truly believe that everybody adheres to guidelines? It obviously isn't a case of everyone does or everyone doesn't...surely?

Multiple criteria; of course. But what criteria?

The latter.

The complete lack of basic numeracy in the wider population when it comes to statistics is depressing.

As for prohibitions - women have at varying times been told to work, not to work, to exercise, not to exercise, to drink in small quantities, not to drink at all, to eat liver, to avoid liver, to avoid coffee, to drink coffee and to remember an ever longer list of prohibitions - shellfish, cheese, eggs, liver, salads, cats, eating out - the list is endless. Most of these recommendations have been based on pitifully poor data and have more to do with prevailing biases and assumptions.

What I’ve never seen is the same generalised prohibitions for pregnant women against shopping, cooking, cleaning, sex or any of the other “women’s jobs” in the domestic sphere which might just impinge on men’s lives.

I’ve never seen widely publicised general prohibitions to men to avoid smoking, drinking or any of the activities/foodstuffs which can be shown to affect the quality of sperm.

We could look at traditionally teetotal populations against non teetotal cultures (which after matching for other factors is how we compare other effects of dietary differences). It is however much easier to give women a long list of “don’ts” with no thought to the impact on their lives.

I’m not aware either of any assessment of stress and wellbeing amongst pregnant women being subjected to this barage of prohibitions.

Just because you granny was told something doesn’t make it wrong. Just because its said today doesn't make it right (and if you believe it does, I have some fine crystals to sell you). Both cases need data to back them up, preferably data which is disaggregated enough to be relevant to the patient.

I didn't even think of sex!

That seems a really unnecessary risk to carry on with during pregnancy.

Exactly and just think of the risks of those chemicals in cleaning materials or the heavy bags of shopping.

Obviously both massive risks and much better done by men for the duration of the pregnancy, whilst breastfeeding, with toddlers in house - in fact probs best if the men do it all until the DC safely leave home.

Oh for heavens sake, of course it is ok to have the odd glass of wine while pregnant. Don't listen to the witchfinders, they are talking rubbish. This over policing of women whilst pregnant drives me mad.

The issue of risk taking in my view is split into two types: one type would be when the substance or activity itself is linked to a risk, such as alcohol, drugs (both prescribed and recreational), excessive caffeine, smoking or having an x-ray etc. The things themselves pose a risk which varies depending on exposure and toxicity. The other type would be substances or activities that are in themselves not dangerous but would be potentially catastrophic if they went wrong, such as eating certain foods (if they are contaminated with listeria, salmonella, toxoplasmosis etc), lifting heavy weights/exercise (depends I suppose on how fit you are to begin with). The car example is extreme but I guess fits into the latter category: being in a car is not dangerous for a pregnant woman but a car crash, even minor, can be catastrophic.
I personally steer clear of anything in category one to be on the safe side and feel category two is all about managing risk.

What is inherently risky about having 1 glass of wine?

I wouldn’t.

Well, there has to be some faith that people as a whole are adhering to guidelines, otherwise what do you think is the point of having them?
You'd be looking at broad patterns in the data, not individual instances.

As for what would be measured - all kinds of things potentially. Incidences of FAS as a starting point, but more broadly health outcomes, educational outcomes, social outcomes. I'm not here to design this piece of research, I'm saying there are ways of looking at the data that's already out there that would give us broad indicators if it makes any difference.

Would you put red wine in a bottle and give it to a newborn? Because it’s just the same.

It's not the same.

The only thing you should give a newborn is milk. Are we suggesting that the OP only drinks milk for the duration of her pregnancy?

Do you have children?
Did you only drink breastmilk throughout your pregnancies?

Do you honestly believe this? That the foetus is receiving pure red wine via the placenta? (And then needing to metabolise it itself) Think about it. Does that make any sense at all? What do you think the alcohol percentage of wine is? And how about blood alcohol after a small glass? It shouldn't take much simple logic to recognise that no, it really isn't the same FFS.

It's the alcohol exposure, even with one glass, the baby will be exposed. Yes, it might be small but considering that the foetus does not effectively metabolise it and that the placenta also soaks up some of it, I couldn't say for myself that it's 100% safe to do it. The problem is no one can say if a low exposure to alcohol is safe. Globally, the guidelines are all the same so there seems to be a real consensus among public health authorities. For me the unknown (ie. no known safe amount) is not an acceptable level of risk but I realise that it is for many on the thread. If there is damage, I believe it's on the baby's brain development (even late in the pregnancy), which can cause behavioural issues. I'm not saying that to make anyone paranoid, just that the risk is not nil so I'd rather steer clear and if I'm asked for advice I'd never tell anyone to 'go for it'.

Absolutely fine. Read Emily Oster for some actual statistics on this.

Again, Emily Oster is a data analyst and holds a PhD in economics. She has studied public health but she is not a medical professional. Not the same as asking an obstetrics consultant or a trained midwife who is currently working (I don't mean from 40 or even 20 years ago)

To add on Emily Oster, some of her views on public health are also very much disputed.

A deep understanding of statistics is exactly, and solely, the skill you need for that kind of interpretive work.

Not solely. It's extremely important but medical training is essential.