Placental Transfer of Sulfamethoxypyridazine

Abstract

BARKER¹ and Speert,² in 1938, showed that sulfanilamide given to mothers before or during labor passed readily across the human placenta and could be demonstrated in umbilical-vein blood at the time of delivery. Subsequent studies by Speert^{3 , 4} indicated that sulfathiazole and sulfadiazine also traversed the placenta. He found that when these drugs were given orally during labor, they might be irregularly absorbed from the gastrointestinal tract, and therefore suggested their use intravenously³; when sodium sulfadiazine was so administered to mothers an equilibrium was established in about three hours between maternal and fetal blood. He suggested such treatment of the . . .