Can medications affect an unborn or breast-feeding baby?
The use of medications during pregnancy and breast-feeding is a complicated issue. It is known that these medicines cross from the mother’s blood to the fetus so it is important to discuss possible risks with your clinician to determine whether the dosage of the particular medication you are taking should be lowered or temporarily discontinued. In general, the most commonly used medications for PTSD, the SSRIs, have a good safety record when taken during pregnancy. Birth defects have occurred occasionally in babies whose mothers have taken medication during pregnancy, but whether the medications actually caused the abnormalities is difficult to know (even without any exposure to medicines, a small percentage of babies will be born with malformations). With regard to breast-feeding, all of the social anxiety medications will pass into breast milk and, as a result, small amounts will reach the infant. While unlikely, it is possible that a breast-fed infant could experience mild side effe
