A study on antibiotic use by pregnant women found a surprising link between antibiotic commonly used to treat urinary infections and certain birth defects. The most widely used antibiotic in the early stages of pregnancy, penicillin, seems to be the least harmful.
Bacterial infections untreated can cause disruption to the fetus, experts said. Therefore, mothers should not completely avoid antibiotics but consult their doctors which should take.
The new study is the first large-scale analysis of antibiotic use during pregnancy. He found that mothers of babies with birth defects were more likely than healthy babies to have taken two types of antibiotics during pregnancy sulfa drugs such as Bactrim and urinary germicides called nitrofurantoin (Furadantin and as Macrobid).
It is the first time it sees a link between the treatments for urinary tract and congenital defects, said lead author Krista Crider, a geneticist at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), which funded the study. “Further studies will be needed to confirm these conclusions,” he said.
These antibiotics, used for decades, which predate the existence of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), with its rigorous trials.
The FDA classified all drugs according to their possible effects on the fetus, but in many cases lack of rigorous studies, which is why no antibiotics reached the maximum grade of “A””.
Sulfa antibiotics are older and some animal studies have found that are harmful during pregnancy. As for nitrofurantoin, doctors thought they could use for the treatment of urinary tract infections during pregnancy.
The study, which appears in the journal Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine November could lead physicians to choose other drugs to treat infections in pregnant women. The findings were released Monday.
The researchers studied the medical records of more than 13,000 women who gave birth to children with birth defects and 5,000 women from the same regions whose babies were born healthy.