Heartburn drugs for pregnant mothers linked to baby asthma

Pregnant woman
Acid reflux is common among expectant mothers Credit: Andrew Matthews

Mothers who take heartburn medication during pregnancy may be putting their babies at a greater risk of developing asthma, new research has found.

Analysis of 1.3 million children revealed those whose mothers were prescribed drugs to deal with acid reflux in pregnancy were more likely to be treated for asthma in childhood.

The condition is very common in expectant mothers because of hormonal changes and pressure on the stomach from the developing foetus.

Drugs called H2-receptor antagonists and proton pump inhibitors can help to block the acid reflux.

They are considered safe to use because they do not affect the development of the baby.

However, researchers at the University of Edinburgh found that children born to mothers who had been acid-blocking drugs during pregnancy were at least a third more likely to have visited a doctor for symptoms of asthma.

But they could not rule out that the association was caused by a separate factor and have advised expectant mothers to continue taking the medication they need under the guidance of a doctor or nurse.

Dr Samantha Walker, director of policy and research at Asthma UK, said: "We don't yet know if the heartburn medication itself is contributing to the development of asthma in children or if there is a common factor we haven't discovered yet that causes both heartburn in pregnant women and asthma in their children.

"The study points us towards something that needs further investigation, which is why we need to see more research carried out into the causes of asthma, a condition that affects 5.4 million people in the UK alone."

Heartburn is caused by stomach acid passing from the stomach back into the oesophagus, the tube that connects the stomach to the throat. The study is published in the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology.

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