TYLENOL AND AUTISM

What should you tell your patients?

Click here for previous newsletters.

1. Counselling Conundrum: a real question from a patient

2. Concise Conclusion: a straight-forward patient-friendly answer 

3. Quick Wrap-up 

Clearly, there are nuances that may not be captured in this format. The goal here is to provide you with helpful counselling tips which often draw from multiple sources or those which are not commonly accessed by busy healthcare providers serving the community.

Counselling Conundrum: "As a pregnant woman, should I avoid Tylenol due to risk of causing autism in my baby?"

Concise Conclusion: Very understandable question, given recent headlines. There is a small correlation, but there is no reason to think it's causing autism, according to the recent research. We also have to think about what risk untreated fever/pain poses to your baby, which can be significant. I would feel comfortable taking Tylenol during pregnancy. However, like any medication in pregnancy, don't take it if you don't need it.

Quick Wrap-up: There are many confounders to this correlation. For example, it could be that pregnant women take Tylenol when they have an infection, and it's the infection that's predisposing their baby to autism. Also consider factors that are much more strongly correlated with autism, like genetics, advanced age of either parent, air pollution, maternal conditions (diabetes, hypertension, obesity, etc), and many more, many of which are modifiable.

Dive Deeper

1) Health Canada: https://recalls-rappels.canada.ca/en/alert-recall/acetaminophen-recommended-treatment-fever-and-pain-during-pregnancy

2) ACOG: https://www.acog.org/clinical/clinical-guidance/practice-advisory/articles/2025/09/acetaminophen-use-in-pregnancy-and-neurodevelopmental-outcomes#:~:text=ACOG%20reaffirms%20that%20acetaminophen%20remains,remains%20consistent%20with%20best%20practice.

3) The study that created the buzz https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/40804730/

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