Antidepressants: Autism Risk Is Not Confirmed
Christiane Fux studied journalism and psychology in Hamburg. The experienced medical editor has been writing magazine articles, news and factual texts on all conceivable health topics since 2001. In addition to her work for, Christiane Fux is also active in prose. Her first crime novel was published in 2012, and she also writes, designs and publishes her own crime plays.
More posts by Christiane Fux All content is checked by medical journalists.Good news for pregnant women taking antidepressants: the drugs are unlikely to increase the child's risk of autism after all. Scientists recently came to the opposite conclusion in a study (houseofgoldhealthproducts reported).
But now a major US investigation has given the all-clear. "It's very comforting," says study director Roy Perlis of Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston. Previous studies on this topic had been inconsistent.
The Boston researchers uncover one possible reason for the inconsistent assessment: Sometimes it was not taken into account that mothers who take antidepressants naturally suffer from more severe depression. These could be the actual factor increasing the risk of autism and not necessarily the medication you are taking.
Depression risk factor
In fact, the current research failed to confirm that children whose mothers took antidepressants during pregnancy were more likely to develop autism later. However, this was the case if the mother had been treated with antidepressants at any time prior to conception. "This supports the hypothesis that it is maternal depression itself that promotes the occurrence of the disorder," the authors write. This is also supported by the fact that children of mothers who had received psychotherapy for depression - and accordingly suffered from severe depression - also became more often autistic.
Disturbed brain metabolism
However, it is still unclear what mechanisms this phenomenon is based on. It is known, however, that messenger substances such as serotonin, which are out of balance in people with depression, have a decisive influence on the development of the child's brain.
The researchers found a similar connection for the occurrence of attention deficit disorder ADHD, which previous studies had already pointed out. “It is more the causes that make the use of antidepressant drugs necessary, and not the drugs themselves, that promote the occurrence of developmental disorders in the children,” says Perlis.
A total of 1200 children with an autistic disorder were assigned to three children with a similar background (age, gender, ethnicity) who had no neuropsychiatric diagnosis. The control group thus comprised around 3,600 children. It also compared 1,700 children with ADHD and 3,800 children without the disorder.
Afraid of the psychopills
Exposing an unborn child to medication is always a difficult decision for parents and doctors alike. This applies in particular to psychotropic drugs, whose interference with the human mind and brain function has not yet been fully clarified and which continue to cause discomfort for many.
However, it is clear that discontinuing the medication significantly increases the risk of a relapse or worsening of a mental illness. And maternal darkening of mood is also risky for the child. During pregnancy, a mental illness in the mother puts stress on the unborn child. This can have a negative impact on development and thus on later life - how and to what extent has not yet been conclusively clarified. If the mother is depressed after the birth, this can also affect the child's development and have long-term consequences.
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