Cocaine use when conceiving

[Angiebie]

Hi - my husband and I have just started trying to conceive today but we stupidly took cocaine 4 days ago. We very rarely take it (maybe 3 times a year) but I’m now worried that it could have some adverse affect on my egg / his sperm and cause some kind of birth defects. Could you please put my mind at rest and let me know whether cocaine can in fact cause harm to a maturing egg and whether we should cease trying to conceive until next month?
Much appreciated!

[admin]

Anggiebie:

It's possible that cocaine could have produced some detrimental effect, but I rather doubt it at this stage. In humans, the woman's body carefully evaluates the condition of the ovum or fetus after its fertilized and rejects them IF your body determines something is wrong with the ovum. In reality, the rate of "spontaneous" abortion is quite high (maybe even 30%) or so because the woman's body detects something wrong with the ovum. This is long before you even know you are pregnant.

Thus, I rather doubt that this onetime use would have had much effect on this ovum. But it's really hard to know for sure.

I'd sure recommend that you be really careful about any meds you ingest during this phase of ovum development. Make sure you take plenty of folic acid, avoid alcohol, and other drugs that may be teratogenic. Talk with you physician about what to take and what NOT to take as far as medications.

Tom Hale R.PH., Ph.D.

[Angiebie]

Thank you so much for the info - really helpful