Women on Anti-Depressants and Post-Menopausal Are More at Risk for Stroke

Stroke Risk for Post-Menopausal Women on Anti-Depressants

Post-menopausal women on anti-depressants face an increased risk of suffering a stroke, according to new US research.

Anti-depressant users aged between 50 and 70 were found to be 45 per cent more likely to have a stroke than women not taking the pills.

Non-users of the drugs were also found to be 32 per cent less likely to die from any cause than those on the medicine.

Researchers said that the overall risk was relatively small - with less than a one in 200 chance of suffering a stroke in any 12-month period.

However, given that vast number of women who use anti-depressants, the effect could have global significance, they said.

Lead researcher Dr Sylvia Wassertheil-Smoller, of Albert Einstein College of Medicine, urged women to not stop taking prescribed medication without consulting their doctor first.

"You have to weigh the benefits that you get from these antidepressants against the small increase in risk that we found in this study," she said.

The research, part of the Women's Health Initiative Study, was based on data concerning 136,293 women who were monitored for a six-year period and was published in Archives of Internal Medicine.