Author(s)

Larry Burd, James Miles, Chun-Zi Peng, Jacob Kerbeshian, Andrew D. Williams

Department of Neuroscience, School of Medicine and Health Sciences, University of North Dakota, Grand Forks, USA.
Department of Pediatrics, School of Medicine and Health Sciences, University of North Dakota, Grand Forks, USA.

The published literature on the prevalence of pregnancy risk markers in patients with Tourette Syndrome (TS) was reviewed. PubMed was searched for papers describing studies of pregnancy risk markers in TS. All years and languages were searched, and the reference sections of each paper were also reviewed for additional citations. We identified 20 studies reporting on pregnancy risk markers in 1588 subjects with TS. Six studies used comparison populations and two utilized twins for comparisons. Three risk markers (decreased birth weight, father’s age, and number of prior terminations of pregnancy) were identified as possible risk markers for TS. To date, no pregnancy risk marker has been demonstrated to increase risk for development of TS, to increase syndromal severity, rates of comorbidity, or to increase duration of TS.

Tourette Syndrome; Tics; Pregnancy; Prenatal; Perinatal; Risk Markers

Burd, L. , Miles, J. , Peng, C. , Kerbeshian, J. and Williams, A. (2012) Pregnancy risk markers in Tourette syndrome: A systematic review. Open Journal of Pediatrics, 2, 18-26. doi: 10.4236/ojped.2012.21002.