Pregnancy Signs & Symptoms, Week by Week Pregnancy Guide

There is good news for women who suffer from heartburn during pregnancy, a new drug called metoclopramide has been tested according to the New England Journal of Medicine and is safe for use by pregnant women.

The study showed that women who used the drug were not at high risk for premature birth, malformations, or lower birth weight when compared to the infants of pregnant women who did not use the medicine for heartburn.

As high as 80% of all women suffer from nausea and other symptoms associated with morning sickness during the first trimester of pregnancy but most women are hesitant to take any medications to alleviate symptoms due to the fear of harming the fetus.

Metoclopramide is better known as Reglan and is approved by the FDA for the treatment of digestive problems. Currently, the drug is used in Europe and Israel as the common treatment of morning sickness, but is restricted to only severe uses of morning sickness in the United States.

The study browsed through the records of women who belonged to Clalit Health Services in Israel to study the effects of birthing complications of the women who used metoclopramide during the first trimester of pregnancy.

Out of the study’s results, birth defects occurred 5.3% in the pregnant women who took the drug and a close 4.9% in births of women who did not use the drug for morning sickness.

Out of the babies that were born to women who used the drug 8.5% had low birth weights which compares with 8.3% of premature births from women who did not use metoclopramide as a treatment.