The perinatal period (defined as pregnancy and the first postnatal year) is aperiod of important changes and great adjustments for all parents. High intensepositive affect go hand in hand with difficult negative emotions making early parenthood a period of important changes, great adjustment and consequently vulnerability to emotional problems. Up to 20% of (expectant) mothers report perinatal maternal mental health problems (PMH).
Perinatal depression (PD) and Perinatal Anxiety (PA) are one of the most common complications of pregnancy. These are debilitating conditions affecting (expectant) mothers, her (unborn) child as well as thesupporting system. Both federal & regional policies strongly aim atreducing perinatal mental health problems.
The current project is the first part of a larger two-part research study. In the first part of this project, we will conduct a longitudinal epidemiological study of PD in all (expectant) mothersreferred to the outpatient clinic of the university hospital of Leuven (n=about 2,000 mothers/year). The second part of this project focuses on the group ofexpectant mothers with moderate risk to develop PD. The aim of this part is to study whether early online self-help intervention that has been developed in the context of http://www.depressiehulp.be may prevent the actual onset of PD in these mothers. To this end, we will conduct a combined superiorityand non-inferiority randomized controlled trial, we will investigate whether acognitive-behaviorally-based preventative online self-help (+ usual care) isnon-inferior compared to a brief 5 session FTF solution-based intervention (+usual care) and superior to usual care. Effectiveness and cost-effectivenesswill be studied.
The main objective of the first part is to improve the prediction and ultimately the prevention of PD, PA and other mental health and behavioral problems among perinatal women. Important goal of the study is the development of the perinatal mental health prediction models/survey.
The study aims to contribute to the understanding of the epidemiology of PMH problems, by longitudinally studying PMH in women during perinatal period, combining descriptive and analytical epidemiological approaches. We will study PMH problems in its full clinical presentation from conception until 2 years after birth and for a full range of both risk and protective factors. There are three main objectives:
1. Development & testing of multivariate prospective models on influencing risk and protective factors on the course of PMH problems, similar to our previous research in college students (Mortier etal. 2017).
2. Development & testing of prospective models of other mental health outcomes (social, relational, professional, …).
3. Implementation of the developed module into the patient file, as a fixedvalue of daily practice.
On a societal level, obtained data will provide straight indication about modifiable risk and protective factors that lead to/prevent the onset of PMH problems. In doing this, this will be a way to reduce the broad societal burden of PMH problems because prevention will lead to a reduction of those mothers who will eventually develop PMH problems and therefore more treatment capacity will be available for those who needtreatment, which will bring an economic benefit. If one can ameliorate thematernal emotional wellbeing you might be able to ameliorate the motor, cognitive and behavioral outcome of the child in later life. This will result in positive effects on the level of the individual, the family as well associety as a whole.
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