Maternal mental illness and particularly mood and anxiety disorders are very common during pregnancy. They are associated with obstetric risks and short-term neonatal effects, but equally a broad range of developmental difficulties in children, who have been found to be at increased risk of emotional and behavioural problems and decreased cognitive performance. Antidepressant or anxiolytic medications are therefore often considered necessary after weighing the known risks and benefits. These psychotropic drugs can pass the placenta and may potentially influence foetal development and thus equally have lasting consequences for children’s development. However, the long-term effects of maternal prenatal exposure to psychotropic drugs (PPU) on children’s behavioural and emotional development, relative to untreated prenatal mood disorders are still insufficiently explored and understood.
The general objective of this project is to examine the associations between prenatal Antidepressant and Anxiolytic use and offspring’s emotional, behavioural and cognitive development, compared to children exposed to untreated maternal antenatal mood disorders and to unexposed children.
This project will rely on data from the French nationally representative ELFE cohort, and proposes to identify prenatal psychotropic drug use through
Project funding: ANR JCJC 2020
ESSMA team members involved :
Judith VAN DER WAERDEN, Ketevan MARR, Maria Melchior
Collaborations : Florence Gressier (CHU de Bicêtre, INSERM U1178), Rosemary Dray-Spira (ANSM), Caroline Dubertret (CHU Louis Mourier, IPNP INSERM U1266) , Anne Laure Sutter-Dallay (BPHRC INSERM U1219)
Publications :
Marr K, Maguet C, Scarlett H, Dray-Spira R, Dubertret C, Gressier F, Sutter-Dallay AL, Melchior M, van der Waerden J. (2023). Social determinants in prenatal antidepressant use and continuation: Systematic review and meta-analysis. Acta Psychiatr Scand;1‐21 ; doi:10.1111/acps.13647
Our team is located on a single site, on the 3rd floor of the Pierre et Marie Curie Faculty of Medicine, Pôle Saint-Antoine
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