Multiple Sclerosis Relapses Decline During Pregnancy, Rebound in Puerperium

To examine use of disease-modifying drugs for multiple sclerosis (MS) before, during, and after pregnancy, researchers used the 2006 to 2015 IQVIA Real World Data Adjudicated Claims–US database, which is designed to be representative of U.S. commercially insured individuals younger than 65. Inclusion criteria were women with an MS diagnosis code and a pregnancy-related code.

Of 205,466 women with MS, a pregnancy diagnosis claim was entered for 10,630, of whom 2158 had a live birth with 1 year of continuous insurance eligibility prepregnancy and 1 year postpregnancy. Compared with the prepregnancy period, odds of relapse declined to 0.62 during pregnancy, increased to 1.71 in the puerperium (delivery through 6 weeks), and ended higher in the …