Smoking and pelvic pain during pregnancy

A lower risk of pelvic pain could be yet another reason for women to quit smoking before becoming pregnant.

Pelvic pain is believed to be a common problem in pregnancy, with recent studies showing that 14 to 33 percent women suffer from it - most often in the second half of pregnancy. The pain can make routine activities, like walking, getting up from a chair or even turning over in bed, difficult. Smoking during pregnancy is linked to higher risks of miscarriage, low birth weight babies and other pregnancy complications.

Few studies have looked into the association between smoking and pregnancy-related pelvic pain. To investigate this, researchers compared 2,302 Danish women who reported having pelvic pain during or shortly after pregnancy along with 2,692 who did not report the problem. Pelvic pain was defined as pain that was at least significant enough to affect a woman's ability to walk. The women were interviewed during pregnancy and six months after giving birth.

It was found that smokers - including those who quit in early pregnancy - had a 20 % higher risk of pelvic pain, even taking into account a number of other factors, such as age, obesity, the women's self-rated general health and whether they had a physically strenuous job. It is not clear how smoking contributes to pelvic pain during pregnancy, though theoretically it could be related to reduced blood flow to the pelvis.