Health & Medicine
Postpartum Depression: 'Baby Blues' Common Among Dads, Too
Kathleen Lees
First Posted: Oct 05, 2015 10:44 AM EDT
Being a mom can be difficult, and for some, the journey to becoming a mother can be difficult, as well. An estimated 8 to 19 percent of women reported having frequent postpartum depression, according to a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) survey. But what about fathers?
New findings published in the American Journal of Men's Health reveal that this transition into parenthood can have a dramatic effect on both parents, as well as the long-term development of the child.
Researchers at the Research Institute of the McGill University Health Centre (RI-MUHC) discovered that a significant number of first-time fathers experience depression, just like mothers, during their partner's pregnancy.
In this recent study, researchers recruited 622 men in Quebec over a period of one and a half years. They gave expectant fathers questionnaires regarding various factors, such as mood, physical activity, sleep, social support, financial stress and demographics, all during the partners third trimester. Researchers found that 13.3 per cent of expectant fathers experienced elevated levels of depressive symptoms during their partner's pregnancy.
Though researchers found that many factors related to depression in men could be modified, for the first time, researchers also looked at sleep in relation to depression risk. From this, they found that the less sleep fathers received, the greater their risk of depression was.
"These are important signals because some of these factors may worsen in postpartum; certainly sleep will be compromised in the first years," said senior author, Dr. Deborah Da Costa, researcher in the Division of clinical epidemiology at the RI-MUHC and associate professor in the Department of Medicine at McGill University, in a news release. Dr. Da Costa is also a researcher from the Experimental Therapeutics and Metabolism Program at the RI-MUHC. "We know that antenatal depression is the strongest predictor for postnatal depression. So teaching fathers and screening for this early on, can be beneficial in terms of decreasing the risk or the continuation of depression."
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First Posted: Oct 05, 2015 10:44 AM EDT
Being a mom can be difficult, and for some, the journey to becoming a mother can be difficult, as well. An estimated 8 to 19 percent of women reported having frequent postpartum depression, according to a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) survey. But what about fathers?
New findings published in the American Journal of Men's Health reveal that this transition into parenthood can have a dramatic effect on both parents, as well as the long-term development of the child.
Researchers at the Research Institute of the McGill University Health Centre (RI-MUHC) discovered that a significant number of first-time fathers experience depression, just like mothers, during their partner's pregnancy.
In this recent study, researchers recruited 622 men in Quebec over a period of one and a half years. They gave expectant fathers questionnaires regarding various factors, such as mood, physical activity, sleep, social support, financial stress and demographics, all during the partners third trimester. Researchers found that 13.3 per cent of expectant fathers experienced elevated levels of depressive symptoms during their partner's pregnancy.
Though researchers found that many factors related to depression in men could be modified, for the first time, researchers also looked at sleep in relation to depression risk. From this, they found that the less sleep fathers received, the greater their risk of depression was.
"These are important signals because some of these factors may worsen in postpartum; certainly sleep will be compromised in the first years," said senior author, Dr. Deborah Da Costa, researcher in the Division of clinical epidemiology at the RI-MUHC and associate professor in the Department of Medicine at McGill University, in a news release. Dr. Da Costa is also a researcher from the Experimental Therapeutics and Metabolism Program at the RI-MUHC. "We know that antenatal depression is the strongest predictor for postnatal depression. So teaching fathers and screening for this early on, can be beneficial in terms of decreasing the risk or the continuation of depression."
Related Articles
Parental Depression Following Their Child's Birth Can Result In Troubling Behaviors As A Toddler
For more great science stories and general news, please visit our sister site, Headlines and Global News (HNGN).
See Now: NASA's Juno Spacecraft's Rendezvous With Jupiter's Mammoth Cyclone