Pregnant women taking antidepressants face almost double the risk of having a child with autism, a new study says.
The findings come from the Journal of the American Medical Association which studied 145,000 pregnancies in Canada.
According to the research, women who take antidepressants later in pregnancy have an 87 per cent higher risk of having a child with autism.
Lead author Anick Bernard, who is an expert on pharmaceutical safety during pregnancy said, “Our study has established that taking antidepressants during the second or third trimester of pregnancy almost doubles the risk that the child will be diagnosed with autism by age seven, especially if the mother takes selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, often known by its acronym SSRIs”.
Common SSRI brands in New Zealand include Prozac, Aropax, Cipramil and Zoloft.
While the research shows significant correlations between anti-depressants and autism later in pregnancy, there was no association between taking the medication in the first trimester or the year leading up pregnancy.
Despite the discovery, the risk of autism is still small, and it’s also important to balance the findings with the risk that an expecting mother may cause harm to herself or her baby if she is deeply depressed.
“The baseline risk in the general population for autism spectrum disorders in children is around one per cent. The studies to date have suggested that the rate in children born to women with mood disorders taking SSRIs in pregnancy may be approximately double at around two per cent,” commented Ian Jones from the National Centre for Mental Health at Cardiff University, who was not involved in the study.
Emily Simonoff, professor of child and adolescent psychiatry at King’s College London, believes that more research needs to be done, however. “All pregnant women, as well as those planning a pregnancy, who are taking SSRIs should discuss the therapeutic options with their doctor, bearing in mind that the present findings do not necessarily indicate a causal role of the medication,” she advised.
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