Antidepressant use in pregnant women could lead to an increased risk of pulmonary hypertension in their infants, suggests a new study published in the British Medical Journal. According to ABC News, newborns with this condition have difficulty breathing on their own and could suffer organ failure and brain damage. Eleven percent will die from it.
Researchers involved in the study found that women who take selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, abbreviated SSRI, are twice as likely to give birth to infants with pulmonary hypertension as women who did not take an antidepressant during pregnancy.
The risk, however, remains low. According to the American Academy of Pediatrics, only about one in 1,000 babies born is diagnosed with pulmonary hypertension.
“You’re doubling the risk of extremely low risk to again, an extremely low risk,” said Marjorie Greenfield of the University Hospitals Case Medical Center in Cleveland.
The study—which reviewed six million births in several northern European countries—reaffirmed a suspicion between SSRIs and hypertension observed five years ago. In July 2006, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration issued a warning regarding antidepressants and a study in the New England Journal of Medicine claimed that babies were six times more likely to develop pulmonary hypertension if their mothers took an antidepressant.
Many experts say the new study results are unlikely to lead to an overhaul in guidelines regarding pregnancy and antidepressants, but instead “add a layer of caution in the continuation of treatment in late term pregnancy,” as Dr. Ammir Afkhami of George Washington University suggests.
Popular SSRIs include Zoloft, Paxil, Celexa and Lexapro. According to ABC, they are taken by approximately 1.5 percent of pregnant women in the United States.
