Antidepressant Use During Pregnancy Does Not Affect Child Development

Use of antidepressants during pregnancy does not affect child development, according to a prospective study published in the American Journal of Psychiatry.

Researchers compared mother?child pairs who were exposed to tricyclic antidepres-sants (n = 46) or fluoxetine (n = 40) during gestation with an unexposed, nonde-pressed control group (n = 36). Neither tricyclic antidepressants nor fluoxetine affected the child?s global IQ, language development, or behavior.

Instead, the mothers? depression was associated with impaired cognitive and language achievement among their children.