Maternal Depression, Anxiety Worsened During Pandemic, Meta-Analysis Suggests

Postnatal depression and maternal anxiety appear to have increased worldwide during the COVID-19 pandemic, according to ameta-analysis published Wednesday inThe Lancet Global Health.“It is clear that pregnant individuals and babies have been subjected to harm during the pandemic, and the onus is on the academic community, health care providers, and policymakers to learn from it,” wrote Asma Khalil, M.D., of St. George’s University of London and colleagues.Khalil and colleagues searched MEDLINE and Embase for studies published from January 1, 2020, to January 8, 2021, that compared maternal, fetal, and infant health outcomes before and during the pandemic. Studies that only included women infected with COVID-19 were excluded.Of the 3,592 abstracts the authors screened, 40 studies from 17 countries were included in the analysis. Overall, the studies indicated increased maternal mortality, stillbirth, and maternal stress during the pandemic compared with before, with a particularly disproportionate impact on low- and middle-income countries.Eleven studies compared maternal mental health outcomes before and during the pandemic, using such measurements as the Generalized Anxiety and Depression Scale, Inventory of Depression and Anxiety Symptoms, the Generalized Anxiety Disorder 7-item (GAD-7) Questionnaire, and the Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale, among others. Seven of these studies reported a statistically significant increase in postnatal depression, maternal anxiety...
Source: Psychiatr News - Category: Psychiatry Tags: anxiety infant health intimate partner violence Lancet Global Health maternal depression maternal health meta-analysis pandemic stress unemployment Source Type: research