80% of postnatal depression cases predicted

Researchers have developed a new way of predicting postnatal depression which is successful in 80% of cases.

Information on almost 1,400 Spanish women who gave birth over a period of ten months was studied and various models were devised to predict which mothers ran the risk of developing depression during the first weeks after giving birth.

The researchers analysed a series of risk factors, including the extent of social support for the mother, prior psychiatric problems in the family, emotional changes during the birth, neuroticism and evidence of genes with high levels of expression, which lead to an increased risk of developing postnatal depression.

According to the authors, this study gives the best results to date in terms of predicting the illness.

The authors also found that two protection factors reduced the risk of depression. Firstly, the older the woman was, the lower her chance of depression. Secondly, whether a woman worked or not during her pregnancy also affected the chance of developing postnatal depression.

The researchers expressed the significance of the findings, given that between 10 and 15% of women who give birth suffer from postnatal depression, normally between the second and third month after having given birth.

“Early diagnosis of postnatal depression would make it possible to intervene to prevent it from developing among women at risk,” said Salvador Tortajada from the Polytechnic University of Valencia, lead author of the study.

"Now it needs clinical evaluation, and for psychiatrists to start to test it directly on patients in order to study the true potential of these tools,” said Mr Tortajada.

The study has been published in the journal Methods of Information in Medicine.

[Posted: Thu 17/09/2009]