Effect of Chronic Maternal Drug Addiction on Placental Drug Metabolism

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Abstract
Microsomes were prepared from the term placentas of 5 drug-dependent and 4 normal (control) mothers and from the livers of 3 normal fetuses (gestational age = 22-24 weeks) to determine if chronic maternal drug addiction can induce metabolic pathways in the placenta which are utilized in the biotransformation of drugs of abuse. Using as model subtrates aminopyrine for demethylation, aniline for hydroxylation, and bilirubin for conjugation,we observed little to none of substrate biotransformation in both drug-dependent and control placentas. Similarly, such enzymatic activity in the fetal liver was also low. We conclude that chronic maternal addiction does not induce metabolic pathways in the placenta for the biotransformation of drugs of abuse.

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