Antidepressants Affect Fetus Ability to Develop

Pregnancy may be accompanied by bouts of depression in many women, but treatment should be undertaken with much care, because antidepressants interfere with the proper development of the fetus, as revealed by a recent study.

“The results of our study suggest an effect of antidepressant exposure on fetal brain development,” lead researcher Lars Henning Pedersen warns in his article published in Pediatrics. The effect of antidepressants, especially if taken during the last months of pregnancy, may tell on the motor development of the child, showing more in boys.
Babies’ ability to sit and walk may develop significantly later if their mothers used medications to fight their depression while they were with the child, compared to babies whose mothers withstood their depression without the aid of antidepressants.

Children affected by antidepressants show two times more cases when a child remains unable to sit unsupported by the age of six months. When they grow to be a year and half, attention problems begin to set in, and they reveal impaired ability to concentrate for a period of time proper for their age.

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