Women who remember, women who do not: a methodological study of maternal recall of smoking in pregnancy.

ABSTRACT:

Introduction

Retrospective recall of smoking during pregnancy is assumed to be substantially biased, but this has rarely been tested empirically.

Methods

We examined the validity of an interview-based retrospective recall more than a decade after pregnancy, in a cohort with repeated, multimethod characterization of pregnancy smoking (N = 245). Retrospective smoking patterns were examined in relation to prospective reported and biological estimates of overall and trimester-specific smoking status and intensity. We also compared characteristics of women whose smoking status was misclassified by either prospective or retrospective measures with women whose status was congruent for nonsmoking across timepoints.

Results

In general, sensitivity and specificity of recalled s

SUBMITTER: Pickett KE 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC2746835 | biostudies-literature | 2009 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature