The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) publishes updated Guidelines on Antenatal Care
March 28, 2008
NICE and the National Collaborating Centre for Women’s and Children’s Health have issued updated advice on the care that should be offered to women during their pregnancy. It recommends that midwives and doctors provide women with evidence-based information about a range of key issues such as the risks and benefits of screening tests and lifestyle advice so they can make decisions that are right for them and their baby. This advice is an update of the original document published in 2003, revising areas where new information has become available.
The guideline includes recommendations for doctors and midwives on the advice they should give to pregnant women about drinking alcohol. These recommendations are consistent with the advice issued in 2007 by the UK Chief Medical Officers and include avoiding drinking alcohol in the first 3 months of pregnancy, drinking no more that 1 – 2 UK units once or twice a week and not getting drunk or binge drinking during pregnancy (drinking more than 7.5 UK units on a single occasion).
Other recommendations include informing women about the importance of Vitamin D during pregnancy and whilst breastfeeding, offering screening for sickle cell diseases and thalassaemias as early as possible, screening for gestational diabetes, and offering screening for Down’s syndrome within the recommended time frame.
Entry Filed under: Babyfeeding, England, Parliamentary update, Pregnancy and birth, Wales. Tags: antenatal, NCT, NICE, alcohol in pregnancy, sickle cell, Downs Syndrome, Thalassaemias.
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Mary Newburn, NCT | March 28, 2008 at 12:04 pm
NCT particularly welcomes the strong emphasis that the updated Antenatal care guideline places on the promotion of informed-decision making. The guideline provides extremely positive recommendations about how women have the right to make choices about their care and screening options. It highlights the importance of women being provided with high quality, unbiased information, the opportunity to discuss and ask questions and sufficient time so that they are able to make fully informed-decisions.
The challenge now is for the health service to implement the recommendations of these guidelines to promote good practice and provide women with the best possible care at such an important time in their lives.