Impact of parental substance use on infant development and family functioning: A pilot study

NDARC Staff

Dr Delyse Hutchinson, Dr Elizabeth Maloney, Professor Richard Mattick, and Dr Lucy Burns

Other Investigators

Professor Steve Allsop (NDRI), Professor Jackob Najman (QADREC), Professor Elizabeth Elliott (Sydney University and the Children’s Hospital at Westmead), Dr Sue Jacobs (RPAH). Numerous associate investigators are also involved.

Aims

The aims of the pilot study are to:

1. Establish the feasibility of recruiting and following up a group of pregnant women (including a subsample of high risk women attending a specialist drug and alcohol pregnancy service), and the feasibility of recruiting their partners
2. Monitor alcohol use patterns and mental health in pregnant women and their partners.
3. Examine the relationship of maternal and paternal alcohol use and mental health with obstetric and neonatal outcomes for mothers and infants.
4. Determine how prenatal alcohol use and mental health problems in pregnant women and their partners impact on infant development (physical, cognitive, behavioural and emotional) and family functioning (family cohesion, conflict, and parent-infant attachment).

   Design and Method

   
   

100 pregnant women and their partners will be recruited during the prenatal period. Parents are eligible to participate in the study from conception up to 40 weeks gestation. Participants will be recruited though antenatal services attached to the major hospitals in Sydney. Participants will also be recruited through specialist drug and alcohol antenatal services to ensure that an adequate number of parents with substance use problems are included in the sample. Infants will be assessed at 12 months of age.

There will be five assessment waves in the cohort study: Baseline (Trimester 1: conception to 12 weeks), Follow-up I (Trimester 2: 13 weeks to 27 weeks), Follow-up II (Trimester 3: 28 weeks onwards), Follow-up III (60 days Postnatal) and Follow-up IV (Infant age 12 months). Mothers will be assessed at all time points, partners will be assessed at Baseline and Follow-up IV, and infant assessments will be conducted postnatally and at Follow-up IV. Multi-method assessments will be utilised including interview, questionnaire and observational assessment measures. DNA is also being collected via cheek swab for assess epigenetic changes over the first year of life (epigenetics refer to the programming of gene expression by environmental exposures such as drug use, stress, or diet).

Progress

68 women recruited to date from the general antenatal clinic. Over 90% of partners have agreed to participate. Preliminary findings presented at the Langton Centre ‘Meeting of the Minds’ seminar series. To date, 44 8-week postnatal follow-ups have been completed, with genetic data collected and currently being stored at the Murdoch Children’s Research Institute in Melbourne. Recruitment of the high risk sample of women from the drugs in pregnancy treatment service due to commence shortly. A number of grant applications have been submitted over the last year to help recruit 100 families.

Funding

UNSW Goldstar Award (Award for a highly ranked NH&MRC Project Grant in 2007)