A mother who suffers from depression during her pregnancy may have a child who has an increased risk of having asthma according to a study. The same is true if the mother took one of the older antidepressant drugs to treat her depression, but not one of the antidepressants in a class called selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs).
The study found that overall antidepressant use during pregnancy did not increase the risk of asthma in the children. The risk of asthma was increased with the use of older antidepressant drugs, including desipramine, imipramine, or nortriptyline. The use of these drugs has been greatly reduced since the SSRI class of antidepressant drugs came on the market. SSRIs include such drugs as Zoloft, Prozac, and Celexa. More than 80% of the women in the study were prescribed SSRIs.
The study was conducted in Denmark, where researchers analyzed the medical records for more than 733,000 children born between 1996 and 2007. Of these children, more than 21,000 were born to mothers who either were diagnosed with depression or received a prescription for antidepressants while pregnant. The children born to mothers who had depression were 25% more likely to be later diagnosed with asthma than children of mothers without depression.
Nine thousand children were born to mothers who received a prescription for antidepressants. Those children had a 26% increased risk of developing asthma.
This finding is an association, and may not mean that there is a cause and effect. Older antidepressant drugs were prescribed for women who were more seriously depressed. Serious depression in pregnant women has been seen to be associated with a risk of asthma in children before. The association between the mother's depression and the child's asthma may be due to factors such as genetics or an environmental factor.
The same study also found that depression in a father is also linked to a greater risk of asthma in a child. This also points to an environmental or genetic factor.
The study was published in the March 9 issue of Pediatrics.