Psychiatric drugs can be used with caution in pregnancy, say experts

The increase in risk of birth defects from use of psychotropic drugs during pregnancy is small, said two experts at a press briefing in New York last week.

The possible risk should be balanced against the risks of the mother’s psychiatric illness, said Kimberly Yonkers, a psychiatrist and director of the perinatal psychiatric research program at Yale University School of Medicine in New Haven, Connecticut, and Christina Chambers, director of clinical research at Rady Children’s Hospital and the department of pediatrics at the University of California at San Diego.

Each year more than 500 000 pregnancies in the United States are …