Prozac & Pregnancy, Please HELP!

Posted By  hfhs.md.db on April 15, 1999 at 22:03:43
Topic Area: Pregnancy - Abnormal
  My husbands psychiatrist and my psychiatrist say that taking Prozac while pregnant is fine.  However my gynecologist says that I should not take Prozac the first 12 weeks of pregnancy.  I have been off the Prozac for a month and a half, I am not pregnant yet.  Me being off the Prozac has cause a lot of problems between me and my husband, because of my moods.  To get to my question I need to know if it is okay to take Prozac during the whole nine months of being pregnant?  Will it cause any development problems with the baby?  Thanks again for your time!  Liisa

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The decision to use a particular medication during pregnancy can be extremely difficult. In each case, the patient/caregiver must weigh the potential risks of the medication on reproduction vs. the risks to the mother from not receiving the therapeutic benefit of the drug.  For many medications, information regarding the potential effects on pregnancy is lacking, or the information is not of sufficient quality to make truly informed decisions. Fortunately, in case of Prozac (fluoxetine), excellent information is available. Although other sources can have useful information, physicians (and other health care providers) place the most significance on articles published in peer-reviewed journals.
Recently, an article on the pregnancy effects of fluoxetine appeared in The New England Journal of Medicine, which is the most widely respected journal in medicine. I have included the full reference to this article (and an editorial in the same issue of the journal) below, and strongly urge you to review this article before making any decisions regarding taking Prozac during pregnancy. The article should be easy to find in any medical school, hospital, or university library, or even in most larger public libraries. In fact, your psychiatrist probably has read the article or at least has easy access to it. If the article has too much medical jargon or is difficult to understand, I would urge you to discuss it with your psychiatrist or prenatal care provider. Here is the reference:
Chambers CD, Johnson KA, **** LM, Felix RJ, Jones KL. Birth outcomes in pregnant women taking fluoxetine. N Engl J Med 1996;335:1010-5.
Robert E: Treating depression in pregnancy. N Engl J Med 335:1056-8, 1996.
I wish you the best of luck in your potential pregnancy.