Sciatic nerve pain in pregnancy can be quite painful for some women, and Neurontin (gabapentin) may be prescribed to help treat it. However, it has been found that Neurontin during pregnancy can also cause birth defects to the unborn infants.

The sciatic nerve is the largest nerve in the body, providing sensory and motor function to the lower extremities. Pregnancy-related sciatica occurs when a baby’s head presses against the mother’s sciatic nerves, which run down the spine and into the pelvis and upper leg area. This condition can occur at any point during a normal pregnancy, but it is most common during the second and third trimester, when the baby is larger and in a lower position in the abdomen.

Women with sciatica in pregnancy often experience shooting pains or paralyzing numbness in the lower back or buttocks area and sometimes down the backs of the thighs. The pain can be severe enough to limit a person’s mobility almost entirely, and because it is caused by the position of the baby inside the womb, there’s very little that can be done to relieve the situation entirely until the baby is born.

What Causes Sciatic Nerve Pain During Pregnancy?

The sciatic nerve runs under the uterus to the legs. The cause of sciatic nerve pain is thought to be associated with pressure on the nerve caused by the developing baby. One of the most common causes of sciatica nerve pain is a slipped disc or a herniated disc (rupture in a spinal disc that causes the gel inside to leak out) due to the additional pressure put by the growing uterus on the sciatic nerves and the spine. However, slipped disc is not the only cause of the condition. During the third trimester, the baby starts shifting into the birth position which may place the baby directly on the nerves leading to severe symptoms of sciatica.

Treating Sciatica During Pregnancy

The main object of treating sciatica nerve during pregnancy is to reduce the pressure on the sciatic nerves that helps to deal with the symptoms. Some options for sciatica relief include:

• Physical therapy
• Massage therapy
• Exercises and stretches
• Chiropractic treatment
• Acupuncture
• Yoga

Sometimes, pain-relieving medication may be prescribed to treat sciatica nerve pain during pregnancy. Any time a pregnant woman has a condition, like sciatica in pregnancy, which requires treatment with prescription drugs, it is necessary to weigh the benefit of those drugs against any possible risks they may pose to her or to her unborn child. Unfortunately, a number of pain relieving drugs have been associated with a heightened risk of congenital birth defects when used by a pregnant woman. One such drug is Neurontin (gabapentin), which has been linked to serious and potentially fatal birth defects and developmental defects when used for treatment for sciatica in pregnancy.

What is Neurontin?

Neurontin is an antiseizure drug approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to treat epilepsy; however, by 2000, 78 percent of prescriptions that doctors wrote for Neurontin were for conditions other than seizure disorders. The new drug was widely prescribed “off label” for more than a dozen conditions, including fibromyalgia, sciatica nerve pain, migraines, menopausal symptoms, bipolar disorder, and even attention deficit disorder in children.

Birth Defects linked to Neurontin

While the true likelihood of birth defects from drugs in babies whose mothers use Neurontin during pregnancy is still unknown, experts have linked Neurontin use by expecting mothers to a higher incidence of developmental delays in children as well as the following serious congenital birth defects:

• Reproductive system defects
• Heart defects including ventricular septal defects
• Nervous system defects
• Cleft lip and cleft palate
• Gastrointestinal system defects

As a result, many women may choose to pursue Neurontin lawsuits against the drug’s manufacturer to recoup damages incurred by an infant’s alleged Neurontin birth defects.