According to a study at the Emory University, published on-line in the Apr.16 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine, pregnant women who took valproate (Depakine), had children whose IQ scores were significantly lower than those whose mothers took a different antiseizure drug. Researchers followed pregnant women in the US and UK from 1999 for 5 years and evaluated 260 of their children at the age of 3. Every mother was taking 1 of 4 epilepsy medications during pregnancy, including valproate, carbamazepine, lamotrigine, and phenytoin. The results were that 3-year-olds, whose mothers had taken valproate during pregnancy, had IQ scores that were 9 points lower on average than children whose mothers had taken any of the other drugs.