Breastfeeding women need to know more about the risks of taking medication, experts say
"It's not really given any significant attention. Women have to just figure it out all by themselves.”
A growing number of babies born in the U.S. are breastfed, and health officials are pushing to make it easier for even more new mothers to nurse their babies. But experts say there still isn’t enough research about one of the most common experiences among lactating women: taking medication.
Scientific studies frequently exclude pregnant and lactating women, which means there’s little information about whether drugs are safe to use while pregnant or breastfeeding, how well they work, or the best doses to take. And in published Wednesday in the New England Journal of Medicine, OB-GYNs say there is still a slew of unanswered questions about drug use while breastfeeding.
