Use Of Medicines For Epilepsy During Pregnancy Can Cause A Risk To The Child

Use Of Medicines For Epilepsy During Pregnancy Can Cause A Risk To The Child.
Pregnant women with epilepsy who are taking carbamazepine (Tegretol) to mastery seizures may be at a somewhat increased jeopardy of having an infant with spina bifida, a green exploration finds. Spina bifida is a adapt in which the bones of the spine do not close but the spinal line remains in place, usually with skin covering the defect problems. Most children will impecuniousness lifelong treatment for problems arising from disfigure to the spinal cord and spinal nerves.

And "For women with epilepsy, annexation control during pregnancy is very important," said tip-off researcher Lolkje de Jong-van den Berg, from the conflict of pharmacy at the University of Groningen in the Netherlands. "Our analysis can help in decisions regarding whether carbamazepine should be the drug of choice in pregnancy" ling wardhak japani oil. However, the best opportunity regarding treatment can be chosen only on an individual point of departure by the woman and her neurologist before pregnancy, weighing the benefits of epilepsy be in control against the risk of birth defects, de Jong-van den Berg said.

The put out is published in the Dec 3, 2010 online copy of the BMJ. For the study, de Jong-van den Berg's tandem reviewed existing inquiry to determine the risk of birth defects among women taking Tegretol. The researchers found that infants of women taking Tegretol were 2,6 times more odds-on to have spina bifida, compared with women not taking any anti-epileptic medication.

However, the chance associated with Tegretol was less than with another anti-epileptic drug- valproic acid (Depakene). In fact, Tegretol was less iffy than valproic acid when it came to other extraction defects such as hypospadias, where a boy's urinary vernissage develops in the naughty part of the penis or in the scrotum. "Carbamazepine is specifically interconnected to an increased risk of spina bifida," de Jong-van den Berg said. "But you have to sustenance in watch over that the absolute risk is small".

For Tegretol taken in the head trimester, the overall risk of a major malformation was 3,3 percent, the deliberate over authors reported. The same group of researchers found in another study, published this year in the New England Journal of Medicine, that women taking valproic acid were six times more no doubt to have an infant with spina bifida and seven times more probably have an infant with hypospadias, compared with women using other anti-epileptic drugs.

The researchers come with a urging from the American Academy of Neurology that valproic acid should be avoided in pregnancy if possible. Dr Orrin Devinsky, chairman of the Epilepsy Center at NYU Langone Medical Center, said that "for women of childbearing age, these drugs draw a risk".

Women demand to command the peril and benefit of these drugs. Women with epilepsy privation to stay on an anti-epileptic drug while they are pregnant. "The gamble of seizure to themselves and potentially to their fetus is greater than the risk of anti-epileptic drugs".

There are substitute drugs, specifically lamotrigine (Lamictal) and levetiracetam (Keppra). However, there is smidgen data on any dangers associated with these drugs during pregnancy. Another expert, Dr Kimford Meador, a professor of neurology at Emory University School of Medicine, said women difficulty to identify the risks associated with Tegretol health supplement prescription online. "If a chick is of childbearing hidden and you are prescribing this drug, that's when the gossip needs to occur".