Preventive Medicine Health Promotion involves empowerment of the
community in improvement its health through education, and provision of preventive
health services. Aiming Educating community at risk and medical staff about
determinants of diseases and their prevalence, and preventing them. The drug abuse
is of increasing concern, and prevalence of simultaneous ingestion of alcohol by
cocaine users was to be high, therefore, pregnant mice were used to study the
teratogenic effects of alcohol and a combination of alcohol and cocaine. In the alcohol
group, pregnant female mice were given alcohol at 2.5 gm/kg twice daily 5 hours
apart by orogastric intubation. In the combined group, pregnant females received
alcohol at 2.5 gm/Kg body weight twice daily and cocaine hydrochloride at 20 mg/Kg
body weight daily by intraperitoneal injection. The control group was given saline.
The treatment was started from 6th day to 15th day of gestation. The dams were
sacrificed on 20th day of gestation (one day before fill-term. The uterine contents were
evaluated and the number of the dead and live fetuses was determined as well as the
number of resorptions. The living fetuses were examined for skeletal anomalies. The
interventional Randomized Control Trial (RCT) teratological study revealed a
significant increase in the number of dead fetuses in the combined group compared to
the control group. Fetal growth parameters showed a significant decrease in the
combined group. A significant increase of the skeletal anomalies was detected in the
alcohol group, but became more marked in the combined group. The present study
indicated that alcohol alone mainly affects the skeletal anomalies, and the cocaine in
the combined group increased and potentiated the teratogenic effect of alcohol on the
skeletal anomalies in mice. Prenatal alcohol and other drugs administration potentiate
the teratogenic effects in the vertebrates, and those abusers should be identified for
prevention.
Keywords: Health promotion, prenatal malformations, drug abuse, randomized
control trial.

download pdf button 11