The American Journal of Psychiatry published two new research papers on Monday, focused on identifying postpartum mental health issues earlier to improve outcomes and save lives.
They were presented at the American Psychiatric Association's annual meeting in Los Angeles, California.
The first research paper is from doctors at Mass General Brigham. It looks at postpartum depression, which affects up to 15% of women after childbirth. CLICK HERE to read it.
They developed a predictive tool that uses electronic health records at the time of delivery to evaluate the risk of PPD to provide monitoring, support, and intervention sooner, and help catch patients who may be missed in traditional screening at a postpartum visit.
The second study comes from researchers at Mount Sinai and looks at postpartum psychosis, a rare but serious mental illness that carries an increased risk of suicide and infanticide if left untreated. CLICK HERE to read it.
Early warning signs include severe mood swings, hallucinations, disorganized thinking, insomnia, paranoia, and thoughts of self-harm.
This new study found, for the first time, that a woman is more than 10 times more likely to develop PPP if her sister experienced the condition, suggesting both genetic and shared environmental influences.
Bipolar disorder is also a risk factor, but they're distinct disorders.
These researchers have been working for years to get postpartum psychosis listed in the DSM, the authoritative handbook on mental health disorders, as its own disorder with criteria.
Two years ago, I spoke with Meghan Cliffel, a PPP survivor who had no history of mental health issues. The mother of three has also been fighting for the diagnosis to be officially recognized, saying it would validate the experience and improve awareness.
Watch her story below:
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"I think the best way to explain it is that for a long time, I kind of just felt like a shameful mess, and when somebody was able to describe it to me, for the first time, to say you had postpartum psychosis and name it, and, it's still not an official diagnosis, but even that, was a way to see a path towards healing, like there wasn't something broken or wrong with me," she said.
Cliffel is now a writer, mindfulness teacher, and advocate for maternal health. I caught up with her on Monday to get her reaction to the new research and continued effort to get PPP listed in the DSM.
"I think it's really heartening to see it being studied at all," she said. "I mean, part of the problem of where we are around maternal mental health in our country right now is that women weren't included in mental health trials until the 1980s, and so we have a lot of catching up to do."
