Parental divorce in childhood does not independently predict maternal depressive symptoms during pregnancy
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(2020) 20:520
RESEARCH ARTICLE
Open Access
Parental divorce in childhood does not independently predict maternal depressive symptoms during pregnancy Elviira Porthan1* , Matti Lindberg1,2 , Eeva Ekholm1,3 , Noora M. Scheinin1,4 , Linnea Karlsson1,5,6 , Hasse Karlsson1,4,6 and Juho Härkönen1,7,8
Abstract Background: This study sought to investigate if parental divorce in childhood increases the risk for depressive symptoms in pregnancy. Methods: Women were recruited during their ultrasound screening in gestational week (gwk) 12. The final study sample consisted of 2,899 pregnant women. Questionnaires (including the Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale) were completed at three measurement points (gwk 14, 24 and 34). Prenatal depressive symptoms were defined as Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale score ≥ 13. Parental divorce and other stressful life events in childhood were assessed at gwk 14. Parental divorce was defined as separation of parents who were married or cohabiting. Questionnaire data was supplemented with data from Statistics Finland and the Finnish Medical Birth Register. Results: Parental divorce in childhood increased the risk for depressive symptoms during pregnancy (OR 1.47; 95% CI 1.02–2.13), but the connection was no longer significant after adjusting for socioeconomic status, family conflicts and witnessing domestic violence in the childhood family (OR 0.80; 95% CI 0.54–1.18). Conclusions: Parental divorce alone does not predict depressive symptoms during pregnancy. Keywords: prenatal depression, depression, parental divorce, family conflicts, domestic violence
Background Depression affects 7–20% of women at some point during pregnancy [1–3]. It is associated with an increased risk of postpartum depression [4], increased number of birth complications, such as premature labour [5] and low offspring birth weight [6] as well as negative health behaviours during pregnancy, such as smoking and substance abuse [7–10]. Furthermore, children whose mothers were depressed during pregnancy are themselves at an increased risk of depression later in life [11]. Besides impairment of subjective well* Correspondence: [email protected] 1 FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study, Turku Brain and Mind Center and Centre for Population Health Research, Department of Clinical Medicine, University of Turku, Lemminkäisenkatu 3, 20520 Turku, Finland Full list of author information is available at the end of the article
being, depression is a major economic burden: lifetime costs of perinatal depression have been estimated to be around £76,000 per woman in the United Kingdom [12]. Prenatal depression often goes undiagnosed [13]. Identifying predisposing factors can help to identify women at risk of depression. Previous research has found that predisposing factors include history of depression [14, 15], traumatic and other adverse childhood events [16, 17], life stress, unintended pregnancy, lack of social support, domestic violence, low income [15] and single marital status [18, 19]. This is among the first studies to investigate w
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