Quantification of prenatal marijuana use: evaluation of the correlation between self‐report, serum, urine and umbilical cord assays among women delivering at two urban Colorado hospitals

• Published in: Addiction (Abingdon, England) England), 2022-01, Vol.117 (1), p.172-181
• Main Authors: Metz, Torri D., McMillin, Gwendolyn A., Silver, Robert M., Allshouse, Amanda A., Heard, Kennon, Jensen, Triniti L., Wymore, Erica M., Stickrath, Elaine, Conageski, Christine, Kinney, Gregory L., Binswanger, Ingrid A.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Abortion; Cannabis; Colorado; delta‐9‐tetrahydrocannabinol; Dronabinol; Drug addiction; Drug use; Female; Gestation; Hospitals; Hospitals, Urban; Humans; Liquid chromatography; Marijuana; Marijuana Use - epidemiology; Mass spectroscopy; Measurement; Medicaid; Miscarriage; Pregnancy; Prenatal care; Prospective Studies; Race; Self Report; Serum; Spectrometry; Substance Abuse Detection; Tetrahydrocannabinol; THC; toxicology; Umbilical Cord; Urine; Women; Womens health
• ISSN: 0965-2140; 1360-0443
• DOI: 10.1111/add.15606

Background and Aims To estimate during pregnancy correlations between frequency of self‐reported use of marijuana and quantified marijuana metabolite in biospecimens including urine, sera and umbilical cord homogenate. Design Prospective cohort. Setting Two urban hospitals in Colorado with legal recreational and medicinal marijuana. Participants Pregnant women (0.10 ng/g) in cord. Findings From December 2017 through May 2019, 51 pregnant women enrolled, and 46 were included in analyses (2 withdrew and 3 had a spontaneous abortion). The majority were normal weight, White or Black race, and insured by Medicaid. At the time of enrollment between 7 to 15 weeks’ gestation, 87% had ongoing use by self‐report, or positive urine or serum. The majority (33 [66%]) stopped using before delivery. Sera and urine results were strongly correlated with self‐reported use frequency (Spearman correlation coefficient [r] range 0.70–0.87 across visits, P