Published 21 October 2009, doi:10.1136/bmj.b4293
Cite this as: BMJ 2009;339:b4293

Letters

SSRIs and congenital defects

Spontaneous publishing and academic miscarriages (SPAM)

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

In 1991, in the week that the Food and Drug Administration held regulatory hearings on fluoxetine and suicide, the BMJ published an article by Lilly employees exonerating fluoxetine, although the article showed a clear increase in risk with treatment and included under the heading of placebo a suicide that had not happened in the randomised phase of the trials.^{1 2} This likely played a part in the way academics worldwide viewed the issues. Since then, in my experience, in the run up to major legal trials or regulatory hearings linked to selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs), one or other major journal has run an article exonerating the drug(s).

In the BMJ of 26 September Pedersen and colleagues’ article on birth defects and SSRIs points to a risk with treatment.³ It is accompanied by an editorial minimising these risks by Chambers,⁴ who has co-authored other pieces advocating the treatment of antenatal depression . . . [Full text of this article]

¹ Department of Psychiatry, Cardiff University

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Author’s reply

Christina Chambers
BMJ 2009 339: b4295. [Extract] [Full Text]

Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors and congenital malformations

Christina Chambers
BMJ 2009 339: b3525. [Extract] [Full Text]

Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors in pregnancy and congenital malformations: population based cohort study

Lars Henning Pedersen, Tine Brink Henriksen, Mogens Vestergaard, Jørn Olsen, and Bodil Hammer Bech
BMJ 2009 339: b3569. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

Did regulators fail over selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors?

David Healy
BMJ 2006 333: 92-95. [Full Text] [PDF]

Fluoxetine and suicide: a meta-analysis of controlled trials of treatment for depression.

C M Beasley, Jr, B E Dornseif, J C Bosomworth, M E Sayler, A H Rampey, Jr, J H Heiligenstein, V L Thompson, D J Murphy, and D N Masica
BMJ 1991 303: 685-692. [Abstract] [PDF]

This article has been cited by other articles:

• Chambers, C. (2009). Author's reply. BMJ 339: b4295-b4295 [Full text]  

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