Study shows no benefit for widely-used pre-term drug

New research shows that one popular drug works no better than a placebo at maintaining pregnancy after the initial bout of pre-term labor is halted, say scientists at the Stanford University School of Medicine, Lucile Packard Children's Hospital and Santa Clara Valley Medical Center, in the USA. The new trial is the first-ever placebo-controlled test of nifedipine, a muscle-relaxant originally developed to lower blood pressure, and its effect on premature delivery with prolonged treatment.

"Medication use should be minimized in pregnancy unless it's clearly indicated," said Deirdre Lyell, assistant professor of obstetrics and gynecology at Stanford and the study's lead author. Serious side effects of nifedipine in pregnancy are rare, Dr Lyell said, but even a low risk is not worthwhile if the drug has no benefit. "We all want to prevent pre-term birth, but prolonged treatment with nifedipine doesn't appear to be an answer," she noted.

The findings will appear in the December issue of the journal Obstetrics and Gynecology.