More than one third of the mothers having born one or more macrosomic infants had an impairment of glucose metabolism immediately after birth. The elevated prevalence of preeclampsia in this group confirms the relationship of hypertension and impaired glucose metabolism during pregnancy. The detection of hyperinsulinaemia, postnatal hypoglycaemia, elevated prevalence of neonatal jaundice with need of further therapy and diabetic fetopathy in macrosomic infants of mothers, whose metabolism was not monitored during pregnancy, pinpoint the need for a diagnostic screening for GDM.

Aims Papaverine is indicated for abdominal pain of various aetiologies. However, data on maternal and foetal safety following gestational exposure are lacking. The aim was to examine whether first trimester exposure to papaverine is associated with increased risk for major malformation and whether gestational exposure at any stage is associated with increased risk for preterm delivery, lower birthweight, small for gestational age, caesarean section (CS), lower Apgar score and perinatal death. Methods A retrospective comparative study consisted of pregnant women treated with papaverine between February 2010 and October 2019 at a large tertiary center. The control group comprised of livebirth deliveries randomly selected from the institutional obstetric database. Results The study group consisted of 498 pregnancies, which resulted in 537/544 (98.7%) live births, of whom 46/537 (8.6%) were exposed during the first trimester. The control group consisted of 498 pregnancies and 514 live births. Rate of major malformations did not differ between study group (2/46, 4.3%) and control (25/315, 4.9%, P = .67). Papaverine exposure was associated with higher rate of preterm delivery (22.3 vs. 10.3%, P < .001), CS (35.9 vs. 24.1%, P < .001) and lower birth weight (3207 vs. 3246 g, P = .02). Adjustment for treatment indication demonstrated that these remained significant only when given for obstetrical/surgical aetiologies. Comparable rates were observed for the remaining outcomes. Conclusions Short‐term gestational exposure to papaverine adjusted for indication was not associated with preterm deliveries, CS, lower birthweight, small for gestational age or perinatal death. Rate of major malformations among 46 first trimester exposures was comparable to controls.