This study pertains to the health of women and embryo, preconception and during pregnancy, when exposed to potentially teratogenic drugs. Stated in the introduction of the study, teratogenic drugs may in fact pose a major threat to the embryo due to its destructive nature in some cases. These drugs are capable of causing abnormal changes to the normal growth of the embryo or fetus, thus leading to improper function and/or structure. At such early stages of growth, these changes are almost always irreversible. In more severe cases, the mother must resort to abortion or a premature birth, which is often associated with mental and/or physical disabilities. This information is known, based off of previous studies that have shown a direct correlation of ingesting teratogenic drugs and complications in pregnancy. Over the years, the number of women who consume these harmful drugs have reduced due to the increased awareness of the effects some of these drugs can have on a growing embryo/fetus. However, based on previous studies, the publisher was able to hypothesize that the women who did ingest significant amounts of these teratogenic drugs, would experience negative effects that would potentially harm the fetus. More importantly to this study, the physical dispensing of the drugs was studied in the Netherlands to Dutch women between 1999 and 2007. As stated in the study, the percentage of drugs that women received during pregnancy in the Netherlands was relatively low, especially compared to the United States, Canada, and Ireland. The number of drugs that pregnant women received in the Netherlands was 4.2-7.8% between 1994 and 2003, while it was only 1.1% in the Netherlands between 1994 and 2003. A direct hypothesis was not recorded in this study regarding the more-current statistics of amount of teratogenic drugs given to women, however it can be said that the percentage of drugs that are teratogenic that pregnant women are given is still relatively low, since the time-frame of this study is from 1999 to 2007, which is not much later than the previously stated study. More questions that were posed in this study include the types of harmful drugs taken by these pregnant women, as well as the periods of time that they were taken for. In this study, the population of women trying to conceive within a year and already pregnant women in the Netherlands were the ones being studied. The PHARMO database method and the Netherlands perinatal registry was used for this study, it has all the records of drugs that have been dispensed to individuals in the Netherlands from pharmacies in their region. It gives the classification of the drug, the amount of it, and the amount of time the individual is expected to take the drug. They watched women that were registered into the PHARMO database that wanted to conceive were taking and women that have already conceived and are pregnant were being prescribed and taking. Drugs that were either classified with a “D” or an “X” were known to be a teratogen drug. For the study the women had to be in the database for one year before conceiving and during pregnancy for the study. PHARMO database network classified certain drugs into categories of how dangerous and risky they were for preconception and women who have already conceived. Every three month period they would analyze the number of pregnant women that received the potential teratogens of their interest. The only drugs that were not tested were hormonal drugs like estrogen, progesterone,
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I learned that it’s very important to watch what you are taking when you are trying to conceive way in advance and throughout your whole entire pregnancy. Even medications or things you are exposed to every single day and can have a detrimental effect on your developing baby. There are many teratogens out there and they can cause delay in your developing baby, prematurity, growth problems, and social problems. I think the study seemed pretty accurate with the study’s they found in how many women were taking prescribed medications that could be potentially dangerous and harmful to the fetus. It actually surprised me that about fifty percent of women were taking prescribed medications and less than thirty five percent weren’t taking any at
I learned that it’s very important to watch what you are taking when you are trying to conceive way in advance and throughout your whole entire pregnancy. Even medications or things you are exposed to every single day and can have a detrimental effect on your developing baby. There are many teratogens out there and they can cause delay in your developing baby, prematurity, growth problems, and social problems. I think the study seemed pretty accurate with the study’s they found in how many women were taking prescribed medications that could be potentially dangerous and harmful to the fetus. It actually surprised me that about fifty percent of women were taking prescribed medications and less than thirty five percent weren’t taking any at