Maternal corticosteroid use and hypospadias

Abstract

Objective: To explore whether women who reported corticosteroid use during pregnancy were more likely to deliver an infant with hypospadias than women who did not.

Study design: The analysis encompassed data on deliveries with an estimated due date between 1997 and 2004 from the National Birth Defects Prevention Study, a large population-based, case-control study conducted in the United States. Included were 1165 cases of moderate to severe hypospadias and 3000 nonmalformed male controls.

Results: The mothers of 39 cases (3.3%) and 62 controls (2.1%) reported using a corticosteroid medication during the period extending from 4 weeks before conception to 14 weeks after conception. The odds ratio (OR) for any corticosteroid exposure versus no corticosteroid exposure was 1.6 (95% confidence interval [CI] = 1.1 to 2.5); after adjustment for maternal race/ethnicity, education, age, and study site, it was 1.3 (95% CI = 0.8 to 2.0). Analyses by route of administration and specific component suggest that elevated ORs occurred only for nasal spray/inhaled corticosteroids (OR = 1.5; 95% CI = 0.9 to 2.6).

Conclusions: Maternal use of corticosteroid medications was weakly associated with risk of hypospadias, but the association was negligible after adjustment for potential confounders.