Research Update

Alcohol Use and Pregnancy: An Important Canadian Public Health and Social Issue

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7.4 Recommendations and Implications

Priorities for research, programming and policy arising from this review of the evidence in support of selective prevention measures are:

Evaluation Research

• Conduct Canadian research on:
  • the effectiveness of using T-ACE, TWEAK and informal methods of asking about alcohol use in health care and social service settings to identify pregnant women who use alcohol
  • the feasibility of implementing routine screening of pregnant women for their use of alcohol in a Canadian jurisdiction and barriers to reporting this on the perinatal record
  • the effectiveness of using brief interventions in health care and social service settings to reduce alcohol use by pregnant women
  • the relationship between partner (male and female) drinking and a woman's drinking and the implications for intervening with both partners at pregnancy

Policy and Program Implications

While awaiting the results of Canadian studies, priority should be given to these promising practices:

• Promote routine universal screening for alcohol use among pregnant women with relevant health care and social services providers, emphasizing the need to create comfortable, safe and respectful contexts for screening and education about alcohol use.
• Promote use of brief interventions using a motivational approach in health care and social service settings as promising methods to reduce alcohol use by pregnant women who are not dependent.

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