Thread: tylenol linked to ADHD

Recent report from a long term study linked tylenol use in pregnancy to children having ADHD later in life.

In a study published in JAMA Pediatrics, an international group of researchers led by Dr. Jorn Olsen, at the University of Aarhus, in Denmark, found a strong correlation between acetaminophen (found in common painkillers like Tylenol) use among pregnant women and the rate of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) diagnoses and prescriptions for ADHD medications in their children. Overall, moms who used the pain reliever to treat things like headaches or to reduce fevers saw a 37% increased risk in their kids receiving an ADHD diagnosis and a 29% increased risk in the chances that their kids needed ADHD medications compared with moms who didn’t use the over-the-counter medication at all.


Read more: Acetaminophen Use During Pregnancy Linked to Higher Risk of ADHD | TIME.com Acetaminophen Use During Pregnancy Linked to Higher Risk of ADHD | TIME.com

That is not quite what the study said according to the news reports I saw. However in spite of the cautonary notes that were incuded in the report I suppose it was inevitable that somebody would jump to this conclusion.

Acetaminophen use in pregnancy studied for ADHD risk - Health - CBC News

ADHD can also run in families, a variable that wasn't fully accounted for in the study.
"Findings from this study should be interpreted cautiously and should not change practice," concludes an accompanying editorial by psychiatric researcher Miriam Cooper and colleagues at Cardiff University in the United Kingdom. "However, they underline the importance of not taking a drug's safety during pregnancy for granted."

I would not take an aspirin when I was pregnant!

Even when I hurt my back and wound up in bed for a week.....refused.

Unless you HAD to....why would you?

Is tylenol aspirin or paracetamol? The same report here (Australia) is citing paracetamol.

Originally Posted by Busy Bee

Is tylenol aspirin or paracetamol? The same report here (Australia) is citing paracetamol.

To my understanding, Tylenol is NOT aspirin but is used in the same way.

Paracetamol, acetaminophen They are both names for the same thing.
It is not the same as Aspirin which is acetylsalicylic acid.

Originally Posted by dan hunter

Paracetamol, acetaminophen They are both names for the same thing.
It is not the same as Aspirin which is acetylsalicylic acid.

What I thought!

Thanks for the clarification!

You may bow now!! *chuckle*

What impressed me was how this slipped passed all the safegards. How could you pick up sometimg like this in an animal study? How do you recognize ADHD in a rat? Sometimes it is hard to identify clearly in a human child. We knew that there was a lot more ADHD being diagnosed and those of us in the psych diagnosis biz could not quite believe that it was just that we were getting better at recognizing it, though we tried to tell ourselves that. The societal costs of this blunder will be absolutly vast. This makes the Talidamide fiasco look like small potatos.

To put it in perspective: Tylenol is the non steroidal pain reliever of choice for all hospitals in the US. It is included on the lists of Standard Physicians Orders that get ordered for everyone unless specificly discontinued. Is has been considered one of the "safe ones". Not safe for pregnant women!

It is an absolute phenomenon to me that when you scrutinize the level of testing, who is paying for it, whether or not it passes the test of impartiality, duration of trials, number of participants and more, it should be an automatic caution to anyone with critical thinking skills that there is risk in taking any medication, which the manufacturers get around by means of a host of disclaimers.

Yet when independent bodies examine any correlations between drug use and health concerns, they are quickly shot down as being inconclusive.

Long term data on most products only comes to light after a significant interval of marketing because it is not available prior to then. In my opinion, the pre-market testing is not as rigorous as the governing bodies would have us believe, especially where profit is the motive. It is a pharmaceutical industry, after all.

Originally Posted by scheherazade

It is an absolute phenomenon to me that when you scrutinize the level of testing, who is paying for it, whether or not it passes the test of impartiality, duration of trials, number of participants and more, it should be an automatic caution to anyone with critical thinking skills that there is risk in taking any medication, which the manufacturers get around by means of a host of disclaimers.

Yet when independent bodies examine any correlations between drug use and health concerns, they are quickly shot down as being inconclusive.

Long term data on most products only comes to light after a significant interval of marketing because it is not available prior to then. In my opinion, the pre-market testing is not as rigorous as the governing bodies would have us believe, especially where profit is the motive. It is a pharmaceutical industry, after all.

I can't speak for acetaminophen as it was developed a long time ago, but drugs today must go through a very rigorous process through development and approval. The average time for a drug to hit the market is something like 12 years. Unfortunately, the human body is very complex and there will almost always be issues that may not have been observed before. Increasing the amount of time needed to develop drugs is just not very practical for the people that could be saved by them and it wouldn't necessarily help. This study is actually a perfect example of that; acetaminophen has been used for over 50 years and we're just now learning about these possible effects. As you said, there is risk with any medication, so that should always be taken into account.

My own view is that if they didn't check the parents for ADD/ADHD history, then they can't say anything much. Especially seeing as they're talking about such a small effect that they're not changing advice to pregnant women.

All I know as, as a pregnant woman in the 1980's.......I never took ANYTHING, unless I was horribly ill.

I think generally, IMHO, pregnant women avoid any kind of medications.

We have precious packages we are carrying.

They did a segment on this on the NBC Nightly News last night. Basically, they can't say how strong the correlation is right now and there will definitely be further studies, but just like anything, what you put into your body definitely affects your baby. Doesn't matter what it is, it will cross the placenta. It's scary being a pregnant woman because you have this huge responsibility. Being a woman isn't easy!

Being a woman isn't easy!

And let's not go too hard on the "no tablets, no drugs, no nothing, when you're pregnant" line. There are too many woman who are ordinary people with little to no medical knowledge who go too far the other way. I'll never forget the day a woman posted a question on a thyroiditis forum saying that as she was planning on becoming pregnant, she was planning on stopping her thyroxine medication. She soon got introduced to the unfamiliar phenomenon of "cretinism" which was one of the reasons it was a good idea to ensure she did take the medication. Cretinism - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Women who are pregnant should also ensure they're up to date with vaccinations and there's also evidence coming in about the additional dangers of flu during pregnancy - namely the apparently higher incidence of children who later develop schizophrenia - so keeping up to date with the current round of influenza viruses is recommended. And as for paracetamol, there are also dangers associated with fever, so it's worthwhile to talk to a doctor about any such illness and to follow recommendations for treatment.

The main objective is for the pregnant woman to keep herself and her foetus and her eventual newborn infant as safe and healthy as possible. If that means taking appropriate medications and therapies then that's what she should do. Blanket bans on "taking tablets" are not the best strategy.

Originally Posted by adelady

Being a woman isn't easy!

And let's not go too hard on the "no tablets, no drugs, no nothing, when you're pregnant" line. There are too many woman who are ordinary people with little to no medical knowledge who go too far the other way. I'll never forget the day a woman posted a question on a thyroiditis forum saying that as she was planning on becoming pregnant, she was planning on stopping her thyroxine medication. She soon got introduced to the unfamiliar phenomenon of "cretinism" which was one of the reasons it was a good idea to ensure she did take the medication. Cretinism - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Women who are pregnant should also ensure they're up to date with vaccinations and there's also evidence coming in about the additional dangers of flu during pregnancy - namely the apparently higher incidence of children who later develop schizophrenia - so keeping up to date with the current round of influenza viruses is recommended. And as for paracetamol, there are also dangers associated with fever, so it's worthwhile to talk to a doctor about any such illness and to follow recommendations for treatment.

The main objective is for the pregnant woman to keep herself and her foetus and her eventual newborn infant as safe and healthy as possible. If that means taking appropriate medications and therapies then that's what she should do. Blanket bans on "taking tablets" are not the best strategy.

Wisest advice is to check with your doctor, and follow his instructions.

Just in time I came across this piece by a woman who's researching this exact question. I did like this important point ...

some of the recent studies on antidepressants in pregnancy suggest that the differences between exposed and unexposed children may be largely due to depression itself, and that once analyses make adjustments for the severity of depression, the differences disappear.

Is the correlation observed between taking a medication and a negative health outcome for infants entirely due to the medication (like thalidomide for example) or is it due to the condition itself? Or some wildly complex combination of the two which might provoke nightmares in researchers for decades to come.

Gal Science: On Whether Things Are Safe For Pregnant Ladies