Gavin Pereira

A Danish team has analysed a small dataset comprising 685 pregnant women and 302 of their daughters at three months of age to assess possible associations between foetal exposure to paracetamol and the infants’ ovarian function. Their study, published in the journal Human Reproduction Open, suggests that girls whose mothers took paracetamol during pregnancy had smaller ovaries and uteri, fewer ovarian follicles and lower levels of reproductive hormones. The authors point out that this is an observational study and therefore cannot assess whether the drug causes reproductive problems or whether these early differences are clinically significant.

The miscarriage rate is higher in women who have had a computed tomography scan before pregnancy than in those who have not been exposed before conception, according to a study published in the Annals of Internal Medicine. The research includes data on more than five million pregnant women in Canada between 1992 and 2023. According to the study, the miscarriage rate increases with the number of scans: from 117 miscarriages per 1,000 pregnancies in women who have had a single test, to 142 in those who have had three or more – compared with 101 miscarriages per 1,000 pregnancies in women who have not had a previous scan.

A study published in the journal PLOS ONE has found an association between paracetamol consumption during pregnancy and attention and sleep problems in these children at three years of age.