Russian women are aware that drinking can damage developing fetuses — but nearly two-thirds continue to drink after they become pregnant, according to new research.

Before doing the study, researchers hadn't even been sure that it was possible to conduct accurate surveys in this population.

"Russian obstetricians said [the women] won't answer or won't answer accurately," said lead author Arlinda Kristjanson, Ph.D., an assistant professor of clinical neuroscience at the University of North Dakota. "But we found that they will and they will say exactly what they are drinking."

Nearly 900 Russian women were interviewed at job centers, physicians' offices, schools, hospitals and clinics for the study, which appears in the February issue of the journal Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research.
 

Of the women, 95.9 percent who weren't pregnant reported drinking alcoholic beverages within the last year — and 60 percent of pregnant women continued to drink after they knew they were expecting. Just over a third of pregnant women reported having had at least one drink in the past month and 7.4 percent reported drinking five or more drinks on one occasion.

In the United States, drinking rates are much lower, with only 50 percent to 60 percent of women of childbearing age reporting past-year alcohol use and 3.3 percent reporting binge use while pregnant.

"This is a very well-designed and important study," said Nancy Handmaker, Ph.D., an adjunct professor of psychology at the University of New Mexico who has studied drinking and pregnancy. She called the study "the first contribution to the literature that really describes drinking amongst Russian women" and said it could help lead to improved screening of women at risk for having alcohol-affected babies.

More than 90 percent of pregnant women surveyed said they knew that drinking could be harmful during pregnancy, but only 71 percent correctly linked it with birth defects and just 47 percent said they had heard of fetal alcohol syndrome.

Unsurprisingly, the survey found that the heaviest drinkers — those who were most likely to be alcoholics and have difficulty quitting — were the least likely to stay abstinent during pregnancy. Although two-thirds of the women surveyed did drink after they learned that they were expecting, the vast majority quit at some point during the pregnancy.

Kristjanson said she suspects that many women believe that only heavy drinking or hard liquor is unsafe. In informal conversations with Russian friends who drank while pregnant, she was told they felt that "as long as it's not vodka, it's not so bad." Most of the women — pregnant or not — primarily drank wine and beer rather than hard liquor, and the majority drank moderately.

The study findings "will be very important in prevention efforts for Russian women," Handmaker said.