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| Volume 11, Number 10 | February 6, 2004 |
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Study tests impact of moms’ medications on babiesBy Kristina Bergen
A University of Saskatchewan researcher is developing a mathematical prediction model that will help determine which medications a mother can safely take while breastfeeding. It’s well known that within the first few days of breastfeeding, newborn babies get the antibodies they need to help build their immune systems. But to protect a child from possible exposure to chemicals in breast milk, women with health issues that require medication, such as diabetes or metabolic disorders, often have to choose between breastfeeding and taking drugs. “With little research data about the mechanisms that transfer drugs into breast milk and infant elimination systems, women lack critical information that could help them make informed decisions about breastfeeding,” says assistant professor of pharmacy Jane Alcorn. Funded by NSERC (the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council) and the Saskatchewan Health Research Foundation, Alcorn’s research may give parents information that will help them better weigh the risks and benefits of medication use during breastfeeding.
Infant exposure to chemicals in breast milk depends upon two factors – the amount of chemical transferred through milk and the infant’s ability to eliminate chemicals from its body. Babies have two primary means of removing drugs and toxins from their systems. One way is to eliminate chemicals by urinating. The other involves an enzyme in the liver called cytochrome P450 that breaks drug compounds apart and removes them from the body. Alcorn’s model measures the amount of chemicals entering and leaving an infant’s body, which helps predict a baby’s ability to use kidney and liver functions to eliminate drugs or toxins passed from mother to child through breast milk. She is currently tracking the development and maturation of cytochrome P450 in rat pups, which have elimination mechanisms similar to those of human babies. She says that age and enzyme maturity affect a child’s susceptibility to toxicants. At birth, an infant’s ability to eliminate toxins is low, but by the first birthday, a baby has reached its full capacity to eliminate toxins. “A key element of whether infant exposure to chemicals in breast milk results in a toxic effect is the degree of maturation of the enzyme involved in protecting infants from the potentially toxic chemical,” she says. Alcorn is also investigating the effects of drugs and toxicants on the transport function in the breast and how chemicals may influence breast milk composition and the child’s long-term growth and development. Mammary transporters are proteins in the breast’s epithelial membrane that carry compounds from one side of the membrane to the other. Transporters play a crucial role in the health of breastfeeding infants. For instance, transporters move large quantities of the nutrient carnitine into breast milk. Carnitine is essential for neural and musculoskeletal development, but newborn babies don’t synthesize the nutrient, so they can only get it from their mother’s breast milk. Alcorn wants to know if transporters transfer chemicals into milk, what percentage of a chemical is transferred and how the chemicals influence transporter function or the micronutrient composition of milk, such as the carnitine, vitamin, or amino acid content. To get more information to parents about the effect of pharmaceuticals, nutraceuticals and herbal products on nursing, Alcorn is collaborating with U of S pharmacy and nutrition colleagues Roy Dobson and Jeff Taylor. The team thinks pharmacists, who are ideally situated to interact with the public, have a good chance of improving the duration of breastfeeding by talking to nursing mothers about medication safety. The SPARK (Students Promoting Awareness of Research Knowledge) program is run by U of S Research Communications in the Office of the Vice-President Research.
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