Bendectin And Birth Defects (Page 30) (Top voted first)

I took this drug in the 1970's while pregnant. Am looking for the side effects to the babies. Drug has been off the market for many years. Not sure on correct spelling. Used for nausea and vomiting during pregnancy. Thank you for any help you can send me. Sincerely, Dana.

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Dee, It's good to see you still have a sense of humour as I've always believed that laughter is still the best medicine. I too tried the apple cider vinegar a few times but it burns my mouth and throat [I don't have any heartburn], as does anything like whiskey or mouthwash etc. Your sharp pain in the gut reminds me of when one of my brothers had a very severe bout of *diverticulitis*, and this was due to his very poor diet over the years. Have you ever taken *psyllium husks* which you can mix with some good old Blackstrap molasses [much better than apple cider vinegar lol] or just the husks on their own with some water or your favourite tipple? I'm hoping that your sharp pain is not because you have a twisted bowel or something suchlike. Have you tried diluting some fresh orange juice down to about 50/50% or more with cold water? I know that certain medications must not be taken with grapefruit juice so do beware of that. *Slippery elm* is supposed to be good for too much stomach acid so I've heard. I've not tried it because I don't think my problem is because of excess acid. For many years I did think that I had excess stomach acid but I now know my problem is the just the dreaded *silent reflux*. There's no sharp pains involved with my *silent reflux* but just a continual level of very annoying discomfort which is quite tiring at times. Have you discussed with your doctor any *digestive motility* problems that you might have? I believe that there is a surgical procedure available where certain nerves are severed in the stomach and this lessens the amount of stomach acid produced. I used to chew gum all the time when I was a kid [and oceans of soda] but then I stopped the gum at about 17 and didn't start again until about 3 years ago. Chewing all that gum could have made my digestive system dependent on chewing gum and the excess calcium from saliva. One thing my mum/mom told me is that when you're unwell you should always have a serious think about what it is [if anything] in particular that you really feel like eating and/or drinking but of course don't consume too much of it in one go. I hope to hear from you here in Perth [Western Australia] that you somehow manage to vastly improve upon your digestion and wellbeing. Stay as well as you can.

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My mom took bendectin in 81-82 while pregnant, and I have symptoms of PCOS, an over active sympathetic nervous system, crooked legs, mild scoliosis, and a pronounced sternum...it's hard to believe that the combination of B-6 and doxylamine has reeked so much havoc for people!...I have to question what the inactive ingredients were and what else women may have been taking or consuming (alcohol, nicotine, aspartame) in combination with this drug; not to mention whether the pregnant women themselves had been exposed to any teratogens or endocrine disrupters while in utero. Vaccine adjuvants and baby formula also add to the "chemical soup"...

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Hi AlieKat. Bendectin is more likely to have 'wreaked' havoc than 'reeked' it, but I know what you mean. I'd love to have the vestiges of the Debendox [Bendectin] that my mum took all those years ago so that it could be analysed by independent experts to see if there were any other surreptitiously-added [or even inadvertently-added] substances in it apart from the well-disclosed B6 and doxylamine etc. After taking only a couple of doses my mum returned the remainder of her Debendox to her pharmacist because she didn't like it, and she was hoping that he had something else available to help stop her nausea. My mum said that the pharmacist just took it from her quietly and didn't say a word, so she just decided that she had no option but to tough-out the rest of her pregnancy with me sans taking any other drugs...and she didn't take any.

If certain other substances [even quite natural substances] had been clandestinely added to different batches of Bendectin, Debendox and Diclectin over the years, in trials to see if any improvements arose in ceasing the nausea then it'd be very difficult to deduce with precision anything much at all because the permutations would be too great. Let's hope that someone hasn't cleaned out their medicine cabinet for many years [in my case 60+ years] and someone else tasked with the job of having to do it recognises the importance of what they see when they come across a few tatty old packets of only partially-used Bendectin, Debendox or Diclectin just waiting to be given to an astute researcher for some analysis.

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Excellent vocabulary sir!....thanks for the correction, and the input. I agree 100% with your notions.

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I took the drug bendictine for morning sickness. I took it 8 months for my son in 1975 and suffered with morning sickness the whole 9 months in 1976 for my daughter, so took it the whole year that year as well. both my children grew up normal and our son has three normal daughters and our daughter has two nearly grown sons, both normal. I was verrry thankful for the drug that helped me get through those days of morning sickness.

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That's very good news indeed Patti, but one can never be absolutely certain that just because it might have said 'bendectine' on the packets that that was what you were given, as you may have been given a 'placebo'. In actual fact, for all anyone knows, all of the women who were prescribed 'bendectine' and then had babies with no known deformities (never forgetting that some deformities are internal and can't be seen), may all have been given 'placebos' as well. You may have been given genuine 'bendectine' and then again you might not have. I doubt that each and every pregnant woman who took genuine 'thalidomide' definitely had a baby with some type of deformity.

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Thank you Interlineal Peruser, I didn't think about the placebo possibility in Patti's case. I have been doing a lot of research online and came across a paper that talked about the dispute going on with doctors and wanting to keep Benedictine available so they were denying the effects it was having. At one point they did take one component out in the mid 70's that they were saying was responsible for the defects but it wasn't working as well so it was put back in. I can't find it now, wish I would have saved it. My issues from this are 'invisible'. I don't like to say 'chemical imbalance', people tend to think 'crazy' or 'mentally imbalanced', my stomach produces too much acid. They called it an over active stomach when I was diagnosed. They were just starting to investigate possible 'invisible' side affects in people who's moms took it later in the pregnancy, after they were fully developed. They tested my acid and it was at 5 or 6 when it should only be 3.2.
Patti, I'm glad your kids are ok. The placebo thing makes sense in your case or the possibility that you got it when they took the one component out, unless the issues are just too vague to notice. It took 15 years of my life before my symptoms had a big enough impact on me for my parents to take me to the ER. I always had tummy troubles and was always tired (still am & still do) but being the youngest every one said I was just looking for attention. It wasn't till I was 15 that the acid really started eating at my stomach and wreaking havoc on my system and caused the trip to the ER. I have had medical issues in my life that don't run in my family and no else has ever had. I believe its due to what that drug did to me. Too much acid in the stomach is carried through out your body and causes other imbalances and damage. Until the medical field admits that this drug is dangerous and has been the cause of birth defects, people in my situation, with the 'invisible' damage, will never get the help we need to try and fix our body's and put an end to the destruction its doing. Its been years since I've had a doctor who call it what it is and not 'all in my head'! I also found out that it was the cause of manic depressive disorder and bipolar in the mothers that took it. My mom was not an easy person to live with and I believe this drug was at least in part responsible. If it can do so much damage to an unborn baby, why would it not also have a devastating affect on the mothers?

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Dee, here's some links to a few articles you may not have seen before:

nemechekconsultativemedicine.com/?page_id=1289

nemechekconsultativemedicine.com/?page_id=1415

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vagotomy

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Placebo is used during the investigative phase of drug evaluations to see if a drug has the desired effect (decreased vomiting, decreased pain, decreased cholesterol, etc) compared to doing nothing (placebo). It makes no sense at all to imagine that Patti was sold a product that was actually placebo as it's highly against the law. Even to enter a study where you may receive placebo you have to be informed that you may receive placebo and not the drug. You are going way down the conspiracy theory pathway to imagine such a scenario to explain that bendictine didn't cause problems. Dee, you say you've been doing "a lot of research". Have you somehow missed all the research and preponderance of scientific evidence that demonstrated no adverse safety profile for the medication? That the drug is safe and does not cause birth defects, autism, acid reflux, bad temper, etc. is the likely explination for Patti's happy outcome (along with millions of other women), not that she didn't actually receive the medication for the 17 months that it was prescribed.

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Same here and my baby was born partial cleft lip

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I took Bendictine in 80 and 83, in 83 the doctor gAve me samples he had because it had been taken off the market. I didn't. Know then about it Causing birth defects, just that it worked great for morning sickness.
Both my boys were/are healthy and have had beautiful healthy children.
After reading the comments here I feel very fortunate.

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emtridoc-There has been a lot of coverup on the side effects to protect their drug and keep it on the market. In the 60's the dosage was much higher then in the 70's and later. They found a smaller dose gives the same relief, but its still dangerous to the unborn baby.

1). birthdefects.org/wp/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/Bendectin-Part-1.pdf
2). birthdefects.org/wp/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/Bendectin-Part-2.pdf
3). birthdefects.org/wp/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/Bendectin-JOP.pdf

Interlineal Peruser- no I have not come across these since they do not pertain to MY medical issues. If you clear your head and realize that you do not know everything, especially some ones medical situation that you have only read a small portion of on the internet, and maybe go back and reread my earlier posts you might see that you are reading things into what I've said that I never actually said. 'Over active', meaning producing too much acid is NOT the same a 'acid reflux'.

I was hoping to find more info on here or at least help out some one in my situation. But there seem to be more people on here that think they know it all and are out to undermine other peoples situations. Time to move on.

Susan and Deb- Its my belief, based on what I was told when I was diagnosed, my own personal experiences that I have had in living with an over active stomach and what I have found out in the years since, that the dosage and timing seem to play a part in what Bendictine may do. Again, at the time my mom took it the dose (mg) was pretty high compared to what it was in the 70's and today. Good luck and count your blessings!

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Dee, I applaud you for bringing some citations to the discussion. In the current Pixar release "Inside Out" there is a scene where the characters are riding on the "thought train" of a young girl and a box of "opinions" and a box of "facts" get knocked over. While one character frets about getting the items back in the correct box the other says "don't worry, they get mixed up all the time". Let's review the citations, all of which come from one source (birthdefects.org), and are a review piece by one author (the head of the organization). The first article is a review of how drugs may act as teratogens. It's largely centered on the history of thalidomide (clearly a teratogen) and cites mostly internal memos which aren't available for review. There are a few studies, essentially all pre 1970's. The author relies on the results of some studies by "Staples" for her conclussions, but these studies are not listed in the citations. I doubt they were submitted for peer review or published. "Part two" of the papers again mentions the Staples studies (again, no citation), lists among citations a number of papers on dyskenisas and dystonia associated with anticholinergics (aprapos of nothing), newspaper articles and most damning, relies heavily on the research and reviews of Dr. William McBride who ultimately was found to be falsifying data (on bendectin), and convicted of producing fraudulent science (not unlike immunizations and autisim). Consequently any conclusions based on his research is worthless. The last citation is of the Blum v Merrell Dow which was found in favor of Blum. Interesting, but if you look further you find that the lower court ruling was overturned by the Superior Court and that decision was further upheld by the PA Supreme Court. The original court jury decision was based largely on plantiff "expert" Dr. Alan Done. However the upper courts, in overturning the lower court decision, noted that Done, not an epidemiologist, chose to ignore 30 epidemiological studies that found no association between bendectin and limb defects and instead picked and chose his own data, ignoring scientific processes (see the Pixar quote, above). Somehow Birthdefects.org failed to list these follow-up conclusions. Numerous studies and meta-analysis (the majority of which are more current then anything cited on birthdefects.org) continue to demonstrate no association between bendectin and the birth defects (and other medical problems) listed here. I've listed many in previous posts here and they are easy enough to look up.

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Here's an interesting article (linked below) hot off the 'press'. It's interesting to note that the 4th-last paragraph begins with: "But it may not work for every woman." It may not 'work' for every fetus also! Mustn't forget the bub! I don't agree with the article's final sentence that the uncontrolled depression will, in *all* cases, have greater risk. It might in *most or many* cases, but certainly not in *each and every* case. And the article's last few words evince that those who promote the use of drugs still don't know beyond all doubt exactly what will definitely befall (beneficially or otherwise) those who follow their advice, nor of course myriad those too who don't.

theconversation.com/pregnant-women-taking-antidepressants-shouldnt-panic-about-birth-defect-claims-44358

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emtridoc, in your #577 post you said: "...it's highly against the law." This is true, but when, in all cases, has something being 'highly illegal' proved to be a simple panacea? Many experiments on humans/animals have already been found to be highly illegal and I've no doubt that many more will in time to come. It's well-known that "laws are meant to be broken", and as much as we might not like them being broken, it's just as well that they are broken, because if none were then there'd suddenly be millions of people out of well-paid work. Many judges/lawyers earn more than $1 million in three years, not forgetting all the others perk$ they get. The authorities are always happy as long as the amount of laws being broken are manageable. It's only when there's too much or too little that you'll hear complaints, and when it's the latter, then new additional laws are hastily enacted before too many people go broke and have to start breaking laws themselves to get by. If only a few go broke and they then have no option but to break laws to survive and in doing so take up any slack then all's seen and said to be well on the home front. I'm yet to meet any judge/lawyer/police officer/social worker who complains to me that they commenced and stayed long in the job they undertook not of their own volition.

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ILP, I will grant you laws are for breaking, but what you're suggesting here (giving particular patients placebo when prescribed bendectin so as to prevent them having children with birth defect) would be a process so intricate, wide spread, and deeply entrenched it would cost millions (billions?) to try and pull it off. You would have to know every patient who was prescribed the medication (pharmaceutical companies don't have that information), you would have to somehow tag them so that every time they picked up their prescription (regardless of which pharmacy) they would get the placebo package, every pharmacist would have to be in on it since they're the ones picking the bottles off the shelf, manufacturing and shipping would have to be involved to make certain the appropriate supplies were there, and on and on. Keep in mind this long before your corner pharmacist had any kind of computer in their shop, so these are all hand tabulated records. Most prescriptions of this nature are provided in 2-4 week increments and the poster who wrote in said she took bendectin for 17 months through 2 pregnancies. She could have easily picked up more than 30 different prescriptions (and quite easily from several different pharmacies). A more plausible (though no less absurd) explanation would be that M/D developed an antidote to the side effects and secretly inj. patients with it. Far fewer steps to pull that off. While there are plenty of known examples of companies covering up or hiding data (hexavalent chromium and PG & E, for example) I can think of zero examples of companies secretly handing out sugar pills to reduce the prevalence of their bad side effect and I'm betting no one here can come up with one. A more likely explanation would be that most things (drugs and otherwise) that cause bad effects don't cause them 100% of the time. We know smoking causes cancer without a doubt, but not everyone who smokes gets cancer. And of course not everyone who gets lung and other cancers was a smoker. So the key is do people who smoke (or take bendictin) get cancer (or suffer birth defects, autism, or the myriad of other things people have brought up here) more frequently than those who don't? In the case of bendictin the research shows they do not. And that, of course, is the best explanation for why the poster had two healthy pregnancies and generations of healthy family since taking bendictin.

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Hello. I am posting on here after reading reading all comments in regards to Bendictine. I see these posts are all from 2013.. It is now 2015... Hope I'm not too late to get some feedback and much needed help from you people who have gone through what I am facing right now.

I have just recently had an ultrasound and informed that my baby shows evidence of club feet. I have been beside myself, blaming myself, trying to pinpoint something I took or came into contact with that may have caused this disformity in my baby. I believe there is something that causes it, we just havent found it yet. So I started researching online a prescription medication I was prescribed by my doctor in my first trimester for my severe nausea. It was Diclectine. To which I discovered after some research, is the cousin drug to Bendictine.

I was not expecting to find what I found. I had a feeling and acted on it and want answers just like everyone else. Linda... Your posts really got me! I'm not saying this drug is the cause. I have no idea. But wow, i was not expecting to find others that have the same claims. Coincidence?? I'm just reaching out, trying to find answers.

I'd really appreciate any feedback or suggestions as to where to go from here. I'm feeling lost. If there is some way I can help, as evidence in the case.. I'd like to. I agree that if we, the victims, don't come out, then we are not able to raise awareness and it may never be uncovered and many more WILL suffer.

Please reply with stories, suggestions, resources, websites, blogs, support groups, anything. Thanks in advance :)

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Curious George, I came here looking for more info myself. My mom took Bendictine while pregnant with me in the 60's. I don't have visible deformities as she took it later. She had tried 2 other meds that didn't work, by the time she was put on Bendictine I was fully developed. She had said they were calling it the 'miracle drug'. My previous posts explain my experiences & issues due to the this drug. I never took anything for my morning sickness due to what it did to me when my mom took it. My child seems to have similar problems with their digestive system & meds not working or having bad reactions to them as I have, limiting what we can take. Unfortunately you will find that some on here are out to prove you have no idea what your talking about in regards to this med (or anything that go against their beliefs!). In my personal journey I have found it hard to find another doctor to help with my issues (I live in a small area) as they all seem to be defending a drug they like to prescribe. Its been over 30 years since I was diagnosed & the doctor I had at that time is no longer around. There are several drugs that have a common ingredient & its this ingredient that seems to be causing the issues. Someone had mentioned researching 'Betty Medeci at birth defects in children'. There is more info there that might be of help to you. I feel for you & am sorry to hear about your news, I will keep you in my prayers. Here are some of my notes from my research. I hope they will help.

thalidomide
Bendectin
Bentyl?
Debendox and Diclectin

also search- Betty Medeci at birth defects in children

affect of morning sick. meds

POSSIBLE TERATOGENIC PROBLEMS WITH DICYCLOMINE IN DEBENDOX

"The sternal changes noted involving shifted ossification centers among kits of Bendectin-treated females by past experience of the laboratory, could point to the possibility of more severe alteration should increased dosages be employed. This is considered of particular importance since this type of change was noted only at the highest dose administered ..." ((Here, I also have slightly miss shaped ribs & sternum)).

Skeletal abnormalities induced in the young of the thalidomide-treated rabbits included club hand and abnormal fusion of sternebrae. These malformations were seen in the kits of rabbits treated with large doses of thalidomide (150 m/p/k/) from day 8 to 16 of pregnancy.

In the Bendectin teratology study, clubbed limbs and sternal malformations were also produced, but at much lower doses than with thalidomide. Despite Dr. Staples recommendation to repeat the Bendectin teratology study at higher doses, the study was never repeated. The original "Staples Study" was the only animal teratology study ever done with three-part Bendectin. Years later, researchers reviewing the raw data from the original Staples Study discovered additional unreported malformations in Bendectin treated kids that had been miscarried or born dead.

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Curious George-I almost forgot.

Here are a couple links to more info. I know its on Bendectin but its the common ingredient in multiple drugs thats causing the issues

bizjournals.com/orlando/stories/2001/02/12/story4.html

sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/089062389500020B

And again, there are people out there trying to make our lives more difficult. Don't let them stop you from seeking your answers. You are not the only one looking & there are people who really do care! Good luck!

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Curious George, It's very understandable that you would be upset and even blame yourself, but you shouldn't. The cause of club foot isn't well understood, but it's relatively common - roughly 1 in 1000 births. There does seem to be a familial (genetic) component and it's more common in male than females, about 2:1. There is a link between smoking, elicit drugs, low amniotic fluid (so amniocentesis) and other enviornmental factors, but again not well understood. There are, of course, many treatment options, so no reason not to believe your child can't grow up to live a healthy, happy life.

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