Macrolide in Pregnancy and Adverse Child Outcomes

Associations Between Macrolide Antibiotics Prescribed During Pregnancy and Adverse Child Outcomes

Over the last 20 years, concerns have been raised about rare but serious adverse outcomes associated with macrolide use during pregnancy. The strongest evidence comes from a large randomised controlled trial (RCT, ORACLE Child Study II) of women with spontaneous preterm labour (SPL), which reported an increased risk of cerebral palsy in children whose mothers received erythromycin compared with no erythromycin. A recent systematic review on macrolides prescription during pregnancy showed consistent associations with miscarriage, and less consistent associations with adverse child outcomes such as congenital malformations, cerebral palsy and epilepsy. In this study, the investigators will evaluate associations between macrolide antibiotics prescription during pregnancy and a range of adverse child outcomes.

The investigators compare children whose mothers were prescribed an only monotherapy of macrolides or penicillins during pregnancy (from 5 gestational week (GW) to delivery and by trimesters). The investigators estimate the risk ratios of major malformation (overall and five system-specific) and hazard ratios of four neurodevelopmental disorders (cerebral palsy, epilepsy, attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, and autism spectrum disorder) with control for potential confounders. The associations will also be examined by subtype of macrolides and treatment duration.

Mother-child pairs will be analysed in a cohort selected from the UK Clinical Practice Research Database (CPRD) between 1990 and 2016.

Study Overview

• Status: Completed
• Conditions: Infection
• Intervention / Treatment: Drug: Macrolides; Drug: Penicillins

• Study Type: Observational
• Enrollment (Actual): 726274

Participation Criteria

Eligibility Criteria

• Ages Eligible for Study: No older than 14 years (Child)
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers: No
• Genders Eligible for Study: All

• Sampling Method: Probability Sample

Study Population

The study population will consist of all eligible children from the source population where the mother was prescribed an only monotherapy of macrolides or penicillins during pregnancy. The source population will be all mother-baby pairs identified from CPRD Mother-baby linkage where the children were born from Jan 1st 1990 to June 30th 2016.

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

• Children whose mother was prescribed an only monotherapy of macrolides or penicillins during pregnancy (between 5 GW and delivery).
• Children born from Jan 1st 1990 to June 30th 2016 in the CPRD Mother Baby Link.
• Children who registered with the GP within 6 months of birth
• Children whose mother was aged 14 to 50 years and had been registered with GP at least 50 weeks before estimated conception date until after delivery

Exclusion Criteria:

• Children with known chromosomal abnormalities and pregnancies with exposure to known teratogenic medications (warfarin, angiotensin-converting enzyme (ACE) inhibitors, antineoplastic agents, isotretinoin, misoprostol, and thalidomide)

Study Plan

How is the study designed?

Design Details

• Observational Models: Cohort
• Time Perspectives: Retrospective

Number of groups / cohorts

1

Cohorts and Interventions

Group / Cohort

Intervention / Treatment

Children whose mother prescribed antibiotics during pregnancy; Children whose mother were prescribed an only monotherapy of macrolides or penicillins from 5 gestational weeks (GW) to delivery. A monotherapy is defined as one or more consecutive prescriptions for a single antibiotic (i.e. same drug substance) separated by no more than 30 days and uninterrupted by prescriptions for other antibiotic drug substances. The investigators will also build a negative control cohort which includes children whose mother were prescribed an only monotherapy of macrolides or penicillins from 50 to 10 weeks before conception.

Drug: Macrolides; Macrolide antibiotics, including erythromycin, clarithromycin and azithromycin. Prescriptions of macrolides will be identified using a drug code list based on the British National Formulary (chapter 5.1.5) and the date of the first prescription was used as the index date of exposure.; Drug: Penicillins; The comparison group consists of children whose mother were prescribed penicillins during pregnancy. Prescriptions of penicillins will be identified using a drug code list based on the British National Formulary (chapter 5.1.1) and the date of the first prescription will be used as the index date of exposure.

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
Number of major malformation overall	Major malformation overall will be defined as any of the 11 major system-specific malformations defined in the European Surveillance of Congenital Anomalies (EUROCAT)(Congenital heart defect, nervous system, eye, ear/face/neck, respiratory tract, oro-facial cleft, digestive system, abdominal wall defect, urinary tract, genital tract, and other malformations). The investigators exclude musculoskeletal malformations which are not reliably recorded in general practice (GP) records, and malformation with known cause such as malformation resulted from maternal infections, fetal alcohol syndrome and chromosomal malformations. The malformations will be identified in the children's medical records using Read codes mapped from the tenth edition of the International Classification of Diseases (ICD-10) code lists provided by EUROCAT.	From birth up to 4 years after birth.
Number of cardiovascular malformation	The malformations will be identified in the children's medical records using Read codes mapped from the tenth edition of the International Classification of Diseases (ICD-10) code lists provided by EUROCAT (ICD Q20-Q26; exclude Q2111, Q250 if gestational age (GA) <37 weeks, Q2541, Q256 if GA<37 weeks, and Q261).	From birth up to 4 years after birth.
Number of nervous system malformation	The malformations will be identified in the children's medical records using Read codes mapped from the tenth edition of the International Classification of Diseases (ICD-10) code lists provided by EUROCAT (Q00-Q07, exclude Q0461, Q0782).	From birth up to 4 years after birth.
Number of gastrointestinal system malformation	The malformations will be identified in the children's medical records using Read codes mapped from the tenth edition of the International Classification of Diseases (ICD-10) code lists provided by EUROCAT (Q38-Q45, Q790, exclude Q381, Q382, Q3850, Q400, Q401, Q4021, Q430, Q4320, Q4381, Q4382).	From birth up to 4 years after birth.
Number of genital malformation	The malformations will be identified in the children's medical records using Read codes mapped from the tenth edition of the International Classification of Diseases (ICD-10) code lists provided by EUROCAT (Q50-Q52, Q54-Q56; exclude Q523, Q525, Q527, Q5520, Q5521).	From birth up to 4 years after birth.
Number of urinary malformation	The malformations will be identified in the children's medical records using Read codes mapped from the tenth edition of the International Classification of Diseases (ICD-10) code lists provided by EUROCAT (Q60-Q64, Q794; exclude Q610, Q627, Q633).	From birth up to 4 years after birth.
Rate of cerebral palsy	The investigators identify children with cerebral palsy using informative Read codes or prescription codes (selected by the Random Forest approach) and validated by a paediatric neurologist (FC) and a clinical epidemiologist with paediatrics expertise (RG) blinded to their prenatal exposure (A machine learning approach to identify cases of cerebral palsy using the UK primary care database.Fan, Heng et al.The Lancet , Volume 392 , S33).	From birth up to 15 years after birth.
Rate of epilepsy	The investigators identify epilepsy by 2 prescriptions of antiepileptic drug (AED, identified based on British National Formula Chapter 4.8) within 4 months or >= 1 diagnosis in children's GP records.	From birth up to 15 years after birth.
Rate of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD)	The investigators identify ADHD by >= 2 occurrence of prescriptions for ADHD ( identified based on British National Formula Chapter 4.4) or diagnoses (attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, hyperkinetic disorders, hyperkinetic syndrome, hyperkinetic reaction of childhood or adolescence, overactive child syndrome and disturbance of activity and attention) in children's GP records.	From birth up to 15 years after birth.
Rate of autism spectrum disorder (ASD)	The investigators identify ASD by at least 1 diagnostic code ((infantile or childhood) autism, Asperger's syndrome, Rett's syndrome, Heller's syndrome, Autistic spectrum disorder, disintegrative disorder, and other pervasive developmental disorders) in children's GP records.	From birth up to 15 years after birth.

Collaborators and Investigators

• Sponsor: Institute of Child Health
• Investigators: Study Director: Ruth Gilbert, MD, Institute of Child Health, University College London; Study Director: Leah Li, PhD, Institute of Child Health, University College London

Publications and helpful links

General Publications

• Kenyon S, Pike K, Jones DR, Brocklehurst P, Marlow N, Salt A, Taylor DJ. Childhood outcomes after prescription of antibiotics to pregnant women with spontaneous preterm labour: 7-year follow-up of the ORACLE II trial. Lancet. 2008 Oct 11;372(9646):1319-27. doi: 10.1016/S0140-6736(08)61203-9. Epub 2008 Sep 17.
• Fan H, Li L, Wijlaars L, Gilbert RE. Associations between use of macrolide antibiotics during pregnancy and adverse child outcomes: A systematic review and meta-analysis. PLoS One. 2019 Feb 19;14(2):e0212212. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0212212. eCollection 2019.
• Fan H, Gilbert R, O'Callaghan F, Li L. Associations between macrolide antibiotics prescribing during pregnancy and adverse child outcomes in the UK: population based cohort study. BMJ. 2020 Feb 19;368:m331. doi: 10.1136/bmj.m331. Erratum In: BMJ. 2020 Mar 4;368:m766.

Study record dates

Study Major Dates

• Study Start (Actual): January 1, 1990
• Primary Completion (Actual): June 30, 2016
• Study Completion (Actual): June 30, 2016

Study Registration Dates

• First Submitted: May 10, 2019
• First Submitted That Met QC Criteria: May 10, 2019
• First Posted (Actual): May 14, 2019

Study Record Updates

• Last Update Posted (Actual): May 15, 2019
• Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria: May 13, 2019
• Last Verified: May 1, 2019

More Information

Terms related to this study

• Additional Relevant MeSH Terms: Anti-Infective Agents; Anti-Bacterial Agents; Penicillins
• Other Study ID Numbers: Heng1

Drug and device information, study documents

• Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated drug product: No
• Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated device product: No