Ruta Nonacs MD, PhD discusses a new medication that may play a significant role in the treatment of postpartum depression in this article.
Dr. Nonacs summarizes the recent trial results released from SAGE-217 and presents multiple discussion points that the reproductive psychiatric community needs to be thinking about.
The company, SAGE, has recently received FDA approval for a medication, called brexanolone, to treat postpartum depression. This medication is novel in that it rapidly improves postpartum depression in a few days, rather than 4-6 weeks like traditional antidepressants. Unfortunately, this medication must be given by intravenous infusion in an inpatient hospital setting. This is both costly, and time-consuming, and we have no data on its safety while breastfeeding. There is also further criticism about brexanolone regarding the results of the study. Now SAGE is in phase 3 trial for an oral form of allopregnanolone analog hoping it will yield similarly quick results. To learn more about allopregnanolone, see our instagram post about it.