In Brief The rising prevalence of women with opioid addiction in pregnancy necessitates understanding of medical, ethical, and legal considerations on the part of obstetricians. In addition to briefly reviewing the medical care of opioid abuse in pregnancy, we offer a careful consideration of the stigmatization of addiction and resultant medicolegal sequelae. We advocate for improved access to opioid maintenance therapy and social services as a means of improving healthful pregnancy outcomes and decry recent trends in the criminalization of addiction nationwide. Management of opioid abuse in pregnancy requires careful consideration of clinical, ethical, and legal complexities.
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Kremer et al. (2015) studied this question.
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