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Re: Glucophage and pregnancy From: Christine Gray De Zarn (anonymous@obgyn.net) Sun, 14 May 2000 10:51:42 -0500 Messages sorted by: [ date ][ thread ][ subject ][ author ] Next message: Christine Gray De Zarn: "Re: question about diabetes and pcos" Previous message: Jennifer: "Re: metformin or hysterectomy?" In reply to: Vikki: "Glucophage and pregnancy" Hi Vikki, Glucophage has been used for 30 years to treat diabetes, with no known teratogenic effects (teratogenic = produces birth defects). In fact, Glucophage (metformin) is specifically the drug described by Dr. Ehrmann yesterday at the University of Chicago, as being a safe and effective drug for those trying to conceive. Some doctors even believe that discontinuing this drug during pregnancy is more risky than continuing to take it, so some women continue to take it all the way through pregnancy and beyond. It reportedly can help to reduce the risk of gestational diabetes. Even so, I don't pretend to be a doctor, so please don't take my comments as a replacement for doctors' advice. That being said, any of the "glitazone" drugs, like Avandia or Actos, have not been demonstrated as safe during pregnancy, and are therefore not recommended. I would not take any chances with these. The drugs that you must be really careful of, because of the effects on the male fetus, are the androgen-suppression drugs, such as aldactone (spironolactone) or flutamide. The problem with this kind of drug is that it "feminizes" a male fetus if it is in your system at the time that the genitalia are being formed (at about the 7th week of gestation and for a while beyond). This would mean that if you had a male child, he might be born with a small, underdeveloped penis and testicles, and might never be able to have children of his own when he grows up. For the same reason, I wouldn't recommend androgen-suppressing herbs like Saw Palmetto during pregnancy, either, unless you know for sure that the baby is female. It's always difficult to know what to believe and what not to believe when doctors disagree. Do you think that it's possible that your doctor was confusing these two classes of drugs used to treat PCOS when you were having this discussion? Christine D. -----Original Message----- From: anonymous@obgyn.net [mailto:anonymous@obgyn.net Behalf Of Vikki Sent: Friday, May 12, 2000 11:13 AM To: Multiple recipients of list PCOS-MEDICATION Subject: Glucophage and pregnancy About 6 months ago I finally found a Dr that was familiar with PCOS (I was diagnosed in '94 just before I got out of the military, and have been searching for a Dr ever since). My Dr perscribed Glucophage and I took it for appx 3 months. My Dr told me that I absolutely COULD NOT get pregnant while taking this drug. He said that it WOULD cause a male child to be deformed. After three months, I quit taking it because my husband and I slipped and did not use protection. I haven't gone back to taking it because we want to have a child and I couldn't bear the thought of causing a child to be born with a birth defect due to a medication that I was taking. I have read over many of the messages here and was wondering if the possibility of birth defects was really as severe as my Dr made me think it was? Thanks in advance for any information you can give me. Vikki Next message: Christine Gray De Zarn: "Re: question about diabetes and pcos" Previous message: Jennifer: "Re: metformin or hysterectomy?" In reply to: Vikki: "Glucophage and pregnancy"

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