Rosemary Nayler: Evesham mother says epilepsy drug risks were denied
Rosemary Nayler says doctors repeatedly told her sodium valproate would not affect her unborn child. Her daughter, Nadia Williams, is now 37, registered blind and deaf, autistic and living with mobility issues. The family is calling for the government to acknowledge what they say women were not told.
Rosemary Nayler, an Evesham mother who says doctors told her sodium valproate would not harm her unborn child, is calling on the UK government to acknowledge the risks women say they were not told about.
Her daughter, Nadia Williams, is now 37, registered blind and deaf, autistic and has mobility issues. Nayler said she took the epilepsy medication while pregnant with Williams in the late 1980s, after doctors advised her to continue treatment.
Repeated assurances during pregnancy
Nayler said she had her first epilepsy attack when she was about 30. She already had three sons, all born before she began taking sodium valproate, and said they had grown up without health problems.
When she became pregnant with Williams at 34, Nayler said doctors urged her to keep taking the tablets after seizures and increased her dose. She recalled asking whether the medication could affect the fetus.
“We queried... if it was going to affect the foetus in any way and we were clearly told that ‘no, there was no effect on the children’,” she said.
Nayler said Williams appeared to have developmental delays after birth. When Nayler became pregnant again two years later, she said the family had begun to notice differences in Williams and again asked doctors about the medication.
“So we again asked the doctors and again were told that ‘no, there would be no problems’,” Nayler said. She said a different doctor later concluded her dose was too high for a pregnant woman, prompting her to investigate the drug’s effects.
Calls for government action
It is thought that sodium valproate has caused disabilities in thousands of children in the UK since the 1970s. Over the last decade, guidance for doctors and patient leaflets have said it should not be used during pregnancy unless no safer alternative exists, and only after a careful discussion of the risks.
Nayler, 72, is among parents urging the government to “admit where they've gone wrong.” She said families should have been told about the possible effects much earlier.
Williams said she was “terrified of the future.” She lives on her own with support, her mother said, and would not be able to continue living independently if that help were withdrawn.
“The last thing I wanna do is end up in a care home, stuck in a corner somewhere waiting for my time to come,” Williams said.
The Department of Health and Social Care said it recognized the impact sodium valproate has had on women and their families and was “carefully considering” recommendations in two reports.
Minister for Public Health and Patient Safety Dame Diana Johnson said the government was working with the National Health Service on measures to support women and families, alongside steps to make prescribing safer. She said the number of women prescribed the drug had fallen since 2018.
A pilot service for people exposed to medicines in the womb was operating in hospitals in Manchester and Newcastle, providing assessments, diagnoses and treatment planning, Johnson said. She also said NHS England and the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency had introduced measures to reduce exposure to valproate during pregnancy.
The documentary Mums v Big Pharma is scheduled to air on BBC Two at 21:00 GMT on Monday and is available on BBC iPlayer.
