Depression after miscarriage can linger for years: study
March 4, 2011
Kenyon Wallace
TORONTO STAR
The loss of a baby can be the most devastating experience for any mother, resulting in anxiety and depression for months or years after the ordeal.
Now a new study shows that women who experience a miscarriage or stillbirth often continue to suffer mental health problems – even after the birth of a healthy baby.
The study, published this month online in the British Journal of Psychiatry, is the first large-scale examination of whether prenatal loss can be a predictor of current and postpartum depression.
“In general, when we look at women who are at risk for experiencing postpartum depression, we never really think to ask about any previous losses,” said Emma Robertson Blackmore, a doctor at the University of Rochester Medical Center and lead author of the study.
“We know that anxiety or depression during pregnancy is bad for both the mother’s and baby’s health, and can lead to things like early labour, lower birth weight and obstetric complications. Identifying women who are at high risk allows us to intervene with treatment sooner.”
Robertson Blackmore, along with researchers from the University of Bristol and the Imperial College School of Medicine in the U.K., followed more than 13,000 pregnant women, many of whom had experienced a previous miscarriage, for three years. The researchers monitored the women for signs of depression and anxiety twice during pregnancy and at four intervals — 8 weeks, 8 months, 21 months, and 33 months — after birth.
A total of 2,823 women reported having one or more previous miscarriages or stillbirths.
The findings were telling. About 30 per cent of women who experienced one previous miscarriage or stillbirth exhibited symptoms of depression and anxiety during pregnancy. That dropped to about 12 per cent after child birth.
Of the 135 women who experienced two or more previous losses, 35 per cent reported feeling depressed during pregnancy, a number that decreased to 15 per cent after the birth of a healthy baby.
“You would expect women to be anxious or depressed in the first six months, but you would then expect it to stop or resolve,” Robertson Blackmore said. “What we found is that this doesn’t happen. It continues.”
Miscarriages occur when a baby is spontaneously lost before the 20th week of pregnancy. About 15 to 20 per cent of known pregnancies end in miscarriage. Stillbirths occur after the 20th week of pregnancy, with most affecting seemingly healthy mothers at full term.
The researchers suspect a combination of hormonal, psychological and social factors cause the depression to continue for extended periods of time after a loss.
Robertson Blackmore says her findings show the importance of recognizing when depression and anxiety become a problem.
“These are very treatable illnesses,” she said. “It really is about seeking help because the longer it goes on, the worse it is for mom and baby.”