Colic is twice as common in babies of mothers who smoke than in babies of non-smokers,
researchers have found.
In a study of 3,345 infants, parents were interviewed about infant crying behaviour,
maternal smoking, type of feeding and background characteristics. Colic was
more frequent in younger infants and infants of smoking mothers, say Dutch researchers.
Compared with babies of non-smoking mothers, the odds ratio for prevalence of
colic in infants aged one month, was 2.01 for mothers smoking less than 15 cigarettes
a day and 2.85 for mothers smoking more than 15. However, the researchers comment
that breast feeding weakened the association (Archives of Diseases in Childhood
2000;83:302).