Perinatal mood and anxiety disorders (PMADs) including prenatal depression (PND) and postpartum depression (PPD) can have a profound adverse impact on the well-being of mothers, newborns, and entire families. It is estimated that 20%-25% [...]
From the Center Director, Dr. Lee S. Cohen: Join us for Virtual Rounds at the CWMH Starting Wednesday, April 1st The last few weeks has brought a whole new lexicon into play from "social distancing" [...]
Various screening tools have been used to identify women with postpartum depression (PPD. The most widely used self-report tools for detection of PPD are the Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale (EPDS) and the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI) having ten and 21 items, respectively. However, the EPDS and the BDI may be too lengthy to use for quickly screening patients in obstetric, primary care, or pediatric settings.
Having a newborn child to the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) is stressful to parents. It would be easy to imagine that in this environment, women may be more vulnerable to postpartum depression (PPD). A recent study assessed the incidence of PPD in a total of 131 mothers with infant admitted to the NICU.
There are many approaches to predicting which women are likely to develop postpartum depression (PPD). Most of these utilize standardized questionnaires and/or screening by health care providers. While these approaches may be effective, they tend to be costly and labor-intensive. A new study pilots the use of social media in predicting which women at risk for postpartum mood disorders.
Women with bipolar disorder or history of postpartum psychosis are at high risk for postpartum psychosis; appropriate interventions significantly decrease this risk.
Wouldn’t it be nice if we could identify women who were at risk for postpartum depression (PPD)? Maybe if we could do that, we could actually prevent the depression from occurring. Or at least, we could intervene in some way so that the depression would not significantly affect the mother and her family.
Postpartum psychosis is the most severe form of postpartum psychiatric illness, occurring in approximately 1 to 2 per 1000 women after childbirth. Although bipolar disorder is a risk factor for postpartum psychosis, a substantial number of women who develop postpartum psychosis have no history of psychiatric illness and experience psychiatric illness only in the context of childbearing. What may cause or trigger postpartum psychosis in this population is not well understood.
Postpartum depression is experienced by 10-15% of women and carries risks to both mother and baby. Untreated maternal depression is associated with negative outcomes for children including behavioral problems, cognitive or developmental delays and impaired attachment. Treatment of a mother’s depression can improve not only her own functioning and quality of life, but can improve her children’s symptoms as well (Pilowsky 2008). Given the importance of a mother’s mental health on her baby’s well-being, the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) released a recent report which recommends that pediatricians screen mothers for postpartum depression at baby’s one-, two-, and four-month visits (Earls 2010).
Postpartum psychosis is rare, occurring in about 1 to 2 per 1000 women after delivery. While there appears to be a strong link between postpartum psychosis and bipolar disorder, it is estimated that about half of women who present with postpartum psychosis have no psychiatric history prior to delivery, making it difficult to identify those women who are at greatest risk for this illness. A recent study, using data from the Swedish Medical Birth Registry, has examined possible risk factors that may be used to identify women at risk for postpartum psychosis.
