Pregnancy and Rituxin

Hi Everyone...I hope you don't mind me posting here but I wasn't sure where to ask. I do not have ITP but my husband was diagnosed about 2 months ago and these discussion forums have helped so much in making heads and tails of the disorder and keeping me sane.

Before all of this happened our plan was to start for trying for a baby in 6 months or so. He is suppose to start his first round of Rituxin tomorrow so I was doing some research and a lot of websites are saying you shouldn't get pregnant if you or your partner is taking this. They say you need to wait up to 12 months from them going off of it. I was just wondering if anyone had any information or had been through this? Of course we'll wait if we have to but this was yet another disappointing piece of information I've learned since this whole thing started.

Thanks so much!

Erin

Im not sure. I got pregnant 7 months after finishing my last rituxian round. Ideally I would have like to have waited the full 12 months. There is no clinical data that rituxian can or will affect a fetus. After all was said and done, my son was born healthy. But they just have no studies done.

This was in the March Platelet disorder Newsletter. I copied the whole thing below. It looks like it's a good idea to wait if possible after rituxan. I hope Brishti sees this. She was asking about rituxan and pregnancy too.

Tigereyes, I'm sure that the doctors include a margin of safety and that your little treasure is fine. He's very cute.

Lily


RITUXAN-INFLUENCED PREGNANCIES ANALYZED

Doctors tell their female patients to avoid becoming pregnant during or immediately following rituximab (Rituxan) treatments. Despite the warnings, researchers located and recorded the outcomes of 153 pregnancies influenced by rituximab. Of these, 90 resulted in live births, 22 of them premature, and 11 with blood abnormalities. The authors recommend that physicians continue to counsel their female patients undergoing rituximab treatments to avoid becoming pregnant for up to 12 months after the treatment ends. If a pregnancy does occur, it is important for the physician to report the pregnancy outcome to regulatory authorities.

Chakravarty EF et al. “Pregnancy outcomes after maternal exposure to rituximab.” Blood. 2011 Feb 3;117(5):1499-506.
www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21098742