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Drugs and pregnancy
Dom
Deactivated Posts: 344 The Mix Regular
We've been asked by the people behind this research projct to ask our users if anyone would be interested in participating.
"DAISY (development and infancy study) aims to look at how the use of recreational drugs during pregnancy influences the development of children once they are born. This means we are interested in reaching women of all ages who are currently pregnant and have used any drugs whilst pregnant, who would be interested in taking part in this study and following the development of their baby.
The study is one of the first to look at these developmental outcomes longitudinally over 3 years. We are therefore very open-minded about the outcomes and whilst we do not in any way encourage drug use, we have a non-judgemental attitude and a commitment to harm reduction in drug use."
If any pregnant women in London who might want to take part or for more info, contact Fleur Braddick
e-mail to: daisy@uel.ac.uk
URL: http://www.uel.ac.uk/psychology/research/daisy/
Dom
"DAISY (development and infancy study) aims to look at how the use of recreational drugs during pregnancy influences the development of children once they are born. This means we are interested in reaching women of all ages who are currently pregnant and have used any drugs whilst pregnant, who would be interested in taking part in this study and following the development of their baby.
The study is one of the first to look at these developmental outcomes longitudinally over 3 years. We are therefore very open-minded about the outcomes and whilst we do not in any way encourage drug use, we have a non-judgemental attitude and a commitment to harm reduction in drug use."
If any pregnant women in London who might want to take part or for more info, contact Fleur Braddick
e-mail to: daisy@uel.ac.uk
URL: http://www.uel.ac.uk/psychology/research/daisy/
Dom
0
Comments
Knowledge is power, you can't tell pregnant mothers not to take drugs without having evidence to back it up
They already know the problems babies can be born with if they are born to addicted mothers, serious withdrawal symptoms of babies born with crack and smack habits, just take a look round some special care baby units. babies born with heart defects due to their mothers abusing cocaine during pregnancy, babies with failure to thrive.
its all very well having the get out clause of saying oh of course were not encouraging you to take drugs in pregnancy, but can we write about you taking them and see what happens to the baby - what sort of experiment is that? its sick, the baby doesnt have a choice in it, yet the baby is the one who is likely to be most affected. Its one thing taking drugs as an adult - thats your choice, but a pregnant womans body is not her own. If she cant take a few months off taking drugs then she doesnt deserve the baby. Im sorry, but this makes me really angry. Ive known a few people who have carried on taking drugs, injecting Heroin and speed all the way through their pregnancies, and i cant understand how they can do that to their own child. The first thing I did when i found out I was pregnant was to stop taking drugs. I could never have lived with myself if there was something wrong with Lenny and I could have prevented it.
These types of studies could even protect unborn babies in the future through the development of techniques which could protect a baby from the effects of drugs in the mothers system, it may also produce facts, figures and educational stratergies for use in detering pregnant mothers of the future from using drugs.
yeah, who cares about the babies
I would say the people who dedicate their lives to do research into what harms them, how it harms them and to prevent harming them.
Im wondering what sort of drugs you think its ok to research the effects on foetuses? crack, smack, ecstacy, speed, alcohol? what would be going too far? what sort of sacrifice is too much?
I can understand what you are saying, but I would imagine that as with my own experience with research, there will be opportunities for the women taking part in this to get help and advice in getting off the drugs, they will not be encouraging them to take drugs for the full term...unfortunatly some will and why not learn from the outcome?
This way will be better educated in the facts of drugs during pregnancy and maybe some will think twice about drugs affects on the unborn.
Again, read what they are saying, they want people who have used drugs and do not encourage drug use. Your anger is at the mothers not the research group.
The only people resonsible for harming babies here are the mothers who take drugs whilst pregnant. These people have decided to track down such irresponsible morons and monitor the baby once its born to see if it is effected as a result of the drug abuse, now in my opinion that can only be a good thing, but we'll agree to disagree.
All this company (group, team, agency, whatever) want to do is get as much infomation out of these mothers sacrifice as possible.
The sacrifice is going to be made either way, why not maximise the use it has?
But thats a different topic isnt it?
'They' are not giving the green light, these people have already decided to take the drugs. And if this research wasnt taking place would carry on doing so.
As to babies being lab rats..dont you think there is research being done on foetal development using real live unborn babies? All the tests and scans done during pregnancy are as a result of research. Research into smoking during pregnancy has hightened awareness of the FACTS. Whether you like the facts or not.
And to give up, as you will know, by what you said, you have to want to.
I have 2 lovely children and would never have put their development or life in any danger, and it saddens me to think that not all mothers actually do care about their children even their unborn. And some are just ignorant of the facts.
At least we have the ability to change the latter.
And I'll bet the women taking part in this research are likely to be paid expenses to take part.
RainbowBrite wrote : some women, saying they are helping with research would be validating what they are doing. they would feel its alright to carry on because they are helping with research
Then these are STUPID WOMEN.
If some-one is stupid enough to use this as an argument they may just be smart enough to realise that without the research there is no proof that taking drugs while pregnant harms your baby, so use the "its not known to harm.. the effects are unknown" excuse to take drugs while pregnant.
You may think its a ridiculas reason, but its no more or less so than "i'm helping with the research".
At least if enough people do help with the research then the next generation will have a nice little paper telling every-one exactly what the chances are of different effects taking place if you use different types of drugs.
Maybe they will learn something horrifying enough to stop people using drugs while pregnant, regardless of how stupid they are.
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All this is written assuming that taking drugs while pregnant is actually unhealthy for mother and baby, as this seems to be something that you are taking for granted (rainbow).
I'm not disagreeing, but i really couldn't say for certain as there is a lack of objective research into the subject.
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A lot of babies wont be harmed by maternal drug taking in pregancy but a lot will. its not a definite and they wont be able tp prove it one way or the other so this `research` wont be a lot of use anyway, plus the fact its unethical.
Yes but what your talking about is the responsibility of the mother, its like saying the NHS shouldn't treat people who have become ill through a drug overdose as it may somehow encourage drug use
Why the hell not, of course you can prove things through research and identify possible areas of future research into the bargain, research may of saved your life on several occasions now, if not yours then plenty of others, you can't ignore issues because your treading on dangerous ground, pregnant mothers taking drugs is a problem, it can't be ignored for the sake of the unborn babies.
Firstly just to outline our research:
We are a bonafide research group based at the University of East London. We are certainly not doing anything illegal and the project has had to be approved by several international ethics committees. Nor is it a small, irrelevant or inconclusive study: we are aiming to recruit a total of 150 mother-infant pairs over the course of the study.
DAISY is a longitudinal study which aims to clarify the effects of recreational drugs on unborn infants. This means that mothers and babies visit us a total of 7 times (if possible) over the course of 3 years and we look at the physical, psychological, social and behavioural development of the baby and the interactions between the mother and baby. The testing takes the form of an interactive play session which is geared towards the enjoyment of both mum and babe. This is not medical research, we are a psychology team.
The simple fact is that little is known about the effects of many recreational drugs during pregnancy. Some drugs have been researched already in detail (tobacco, alcohol, cocaine) whilst others have yet to be looked at.
I would especially like to stress that we do not give any substances to pregnant women nor encourage them to take recreational drugs in any way. In our 'babylab' we provide written material and contact information on support groups which could help drug-using mothers to enhance the safety to their developing foetus and baby once he/she is born.
Lastly (and for me most importantly), as a group we do not share the judgmental attitude of some others here against recreational drug-using pregnant women.
FACT: some women take drugs whilst they're pregnant.
This could be for several reasons including : having taken drugs before they realised they were pregnant or the belief that some drugs are 'safe' to take whilst pregnant.
The whole point of our research is to try to discover if babies born after exposure to drugs during pregnancy have any developmental problems, and if so, what form these take. This information will contribute to better planning of care and intervention for these babies and children and a greater awareness amongst pregnant women of the possible effects of drug taking.
I hope this is all a bit clearer now and that I have assuaged some of the fears expressed by people here. It has certainly been interesting for me to read some of the opinions of others outside the study. And reassuring to find some sound attitudes towards what I think is important and timely research.
Cheers
Fleur.
:eek2: :chin:
May I ask some questions....
Are you carrying out any medical examinations of the mothers and babies? As you say, a lot of the substances you are looking at have not had conclussive tests completed to find out what effects they can lead to. It would be a shame to waste this research oppertunity to only find out about 1 aspect of the users / babies health.
How are you ensureing objectivity of all members of your team.
How are you ensureing objectivity of the test subjects (as they all use drugs, and have put their babies lives / health at risk you can assume they will be bias towards drugs being harmless)?
How are you funded by (this goes back to objectivity of your team, but can have a more damaging effect on the results).
Are you only looking at case's where the child is being looked after by the drug taking mother?
It may be a case that if your parents / mother takes drugs through pregnancy she is likly to carry on after the baby is born, which may make her a less capable mother than a non-drug taking one, which would effect the childs development.
Is this being taken into account, if so how?
Sorry, but i rarely get to ask serious researchers questions like this.... Feel free to tell me to go away.
When I said we don't do medical research, I suppose I meant that we don't do any invasive tests on the babies we see. we do check some physical measurements (head circumference, weight, length) which can indicate health but also can vary greatly in perfectly healthy babies. We also check motor reflexes and abilities as development progresses. Any other medical checks would be done by an individual's GP or health worker and is at the mother's descretion to tell us. For reasons of confidentiality, we cannot automatically recieve medical data about participants.
"How are you ensureing objectivity of all members of your team."
well, we are split into 2 rough groups: drugs and infancy. those of us who test the babies are blind to the drug-taking status of the mothers so that we can't subconsciously bias the results in any direction. As for the objectivity of the group as a whole, when we applied to do research in this area and were interviewed for jobs, I think it was implicit that we would have an open-minded attitude or else we could kiss goodbye to having anyone want to participate in our study.
"How are you ensureing objectivity of the test subjects (as they all use drugs, and have put their babies lives / health at risk you can assume they will be bias towards drugs being harmless)?"
I think all parents want their babies to be super and gifted and to perform highly on psychological tests.All parents are biased. But babies can't really fake it or cheat, can they?
Also it may be that some mothers are extremely worried that the drugs are not harmless, and bias the other way (ie. see problems where there aren't any) so the tests are all standardised.
"How are you funded by (this goes back to objectivity of your team, but can have a more damaging effect on the results)."
The funding for this project comes from the National Institute of Drug Abuse (in America) and the study is a collaboration with Case Western Reserve University. But all the data is being collected by this team in London. As for the results, they will kind of be the joint property of the 3 places involved, and obviously will be made public at the end of it all.
We're looking at any case where recreational drugs were used during pregnancy. but we try to ascertain the drug-taking activity of parents at every point both before and after birth, and considering it as a variable (along with about a zillion other things...) I couldn't really say how drug taking or withdrawal might affect post-natal parenting skills. Maybe we'll know more exactly in 3 years time.
ok, i'm off home now. I'll stop waffling on.
byeee
fleur
You have addressed most of the issues I have with... well ... most funded research projects... and even answerd the questions that don't look so good for you
National Institute of Drug Abuse (in America) ....
which is state funded... but thats fine. The USA is well known for its objective and clear viewed outlook on recreational drug use.
But, you cannot be responsible for who pays your wages, right?
One question you didn't answer (and i know you have kindly offerd answers to the rest... but i'm never satified
Are you only looking at case's where the child is being looked after by the drug taking mother?
It may be a case that if your parents / mother takes drugs through pregnancy she is likly to carry on after the baby is born, which may make her a less capable mother than a non-drug taking one, which would effect the childs development.
Essentailly this is asking if you are looking at whether taking drugs as a parent is detremental to your parenting skills, to the point that it adversly effects the development of the child.
Actually looking back you have kinda answerd this... and answerd it honestly, which is why its only a kinda answer.
Thank you for your response. No further response is asked for from me.
(really i am impressed, not many people give a honest answer over an answer that makes them look good. A real rarity.)
Well I'm not sure how objective they are but their aims are clear.
"The USA is well known for its objective and clear viewed outlook on recreational drug use."
Sorry, that was sarcasm. I forget you can't see my face.