Pregnant women are often steering clear of drugs that might ease problems like nausea and urinary tract infections even though the treatments may be safe, a U.K. study suggests.
Researchers surveyed 1,120 women about common problems they experienced during pregnancy
Pregnant women are often steering clear of drugs that might ease problems like nausea and urinary tract infections even though the treatments may be safe, a U.K. study suggests.
Researchers surveyed 1,120 women about common problems they experienced during pregnancy and whether they thought medications to treat these issues were harmful or beneficial.
Overall, about 76 percent of the women reported taking medication for at least one of eight common conditions during pregnancy including nausea, heartburn, constipation, colds, urinary tract infections, neck or pelvic pain, headaches and sleeping problems.
But for some problems, many women didn’t take medications, even when drugs might not be harmful or forgoing treatment might be dangerous, researchers report in the International Journal of Clinical Pharmacy, online May 30.
“Many women avoid medications as they fear harming the child,” said lead study author Michael Twigg, a pharmacy researcher at the University of East Anglia.
“We don’t want women to avoid medication and suffer unnecessarily from conditions that can be treated relatively easily,” Twigg added by email.
To understand how women think about medication use during pregnancy, Twigg and colleagues analyzed data from an online survey of women in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.
Roughly 40 percent of the participants were pregnant when they completed the survey, while the rest had given birth within the previous year.
About 17 percent of the women reported having a chronic medical condition, most often asthma, allergies, depression, anxiety or thyroid issues.
For common pregnancy issues like nausea, sleep problems and constipation, women often avoided medication even though there are certain treatments available that are not considered harmful, the study found.
Even though about 79 percent of women experienced nausea during pregnancy, for example, only around 10 percent of them took medication.
Non-prescription anti-nausea drugs offer an example of how women may needlessly suffer and potentially allow small problems to escalate into bigger ones by avoiding treatment, sa