Depression Poses Dilemma for Pregnant Women

Pregnant women suffering from depression face a dilemma: take an antidepressant that might pose a risk to the fetus or battle through the depressive symptoms that could harm the baby in other ways?

To help women in this predicament decide on a course of action, experts from the American Psychiatric Association (APA) and the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) teamed up to review existing data and make recommendations for managing depression during pregnancy.

Unfortunately, existing data are limited, given that pregnant women are rarely recruited for clinical trials. There is no data, for example, from the kind of randomized controlled trials considered the gold standard of research. Rather, much of our current information comes from large European observational studies that cannot control for factors other than medication use that may be affecting the pregnancies.

As many as 25% of all pregnant women suffer from depression; about 12.5% use an antidepressant at some point during pregnancy, according to the latest statistics. Although many antidepressants appear to be safe, studies have reported a slight increased risk of some fetal defects. Drug withdrawal and persistant pulmonary hypertension – a condition that can impair blood flow to the lungs – are other potential newborn problems.

Source: Healthcommunities