Pregnancy During or Soon After Use of the Pill

Remembering to take a pill every day can be difficult; thus, 9% of oral contraceptive (OC) users conceive within their first year of OC use. To assess whether OC use is associated with excess risk for birth defects, researchers analyzed Danish registry data on 880,694 live births between 1997 and 2011.

In analyses adjusted for maternal age, smoking, health status, medication use, parity, history of birth defects in a previous pregnancy, and other demographic variables (e.g., calendar year of pregnancy), no increase in major birth defects was seen whether OCs were used just before pregnancy or during early pregnancy.