InPreSS consortium study, lead by CPE’s Carolyn Cesta, cited in The New York Times

A recent study by the International Pregnancy Safety Study (InPreSS) consortium, was cited in The New York Times in a piece on the use of weight-loss drugs before pregnancy. Ozempic and other GLP-1 receptor agonists, recently gained regulatory approval for treatment of obesity, in addition to their original indication, Type 2 diabetes. 

As the NY Times article outlines, these new weight-loss drugs could be a valuable tool for women who are advised to lose weight before attempting pregnancy, however the evidence on their safety in pregnancy is scarce. The study by Carolyn Cesta and her team, published in JAMA Internal Medicine in February 2024, is one of the few human studies, and by far the largest so far, on this topic. They found that women with type 2 diabetes who were taking a GLP-1 receptor agonists when they conceived or in early pregnancy did not have a higher risk of delivering infants with major congenital malformations compared to those who used insulin.