Cancer diagnoses can be debilitating. While it can be frustrating for one and all, it is especially devastating for a pregnant woman.
But have heart! Researchers at the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven in Belgium have found that cancer treatment like chemotherapy did not bestow any negative effects on the fetuses of mothers treated with the same.
However, the said treatments were avoiding during the first 12 to 14 weeks of pregnancy when the risk of birth defects is the highest. Chemotherapy rounds during second and third trimester were safe for both mother-to-be and fetus, the researchers marked.
The Study
For the purpose of the study, researchers looked at pregnant women diagnosed with breast or blood cancer.
While under normal circumstances such women must have been advised to abort their fetus, these women decided to continue otherwise.
Researchers found that babies born to women who received chemotherapy, radiotherapy or surgery alone developed normally as compared to babies born to mothers who were cancer free.
“We found no significant differences in mental development among children exposed to chemotherapy, radiotherapy, surgery alone or no treatment,” Frederic Amant, study’s lead researcher and a professor and gynecological oncologist at the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven in Belgium said. “To some extent it’s quite surprising because cancer treatment is quite toxic.”
“Pregnant women with cancer can be treated just as effectively as non-pregnant women,” Amant added.
The findings of the study are published in the current issue of the New England Journal of Medicine.
