Postpartum maternal anxiety and depression during COVID-19 pandemic: rates, risk factors and relations with maternal bonding

Xavier Benarous (1, 2) , Charlotte Brocheton , Charline Bonnay , Laure Boissel (3) , Cécile Crovetto (4) , Hélène Lahaye (4) , Jean-Marc Guilé (4, 1) , Pierrick Theret (5) , Jean Gondry (1, 2) , Arthur Foulon (2)

1 GRAMFC - Groupe de Recherche sur l'Analyse Multimodale de la Fonction Cérébrale - UMR INSERM_S 1105
2 CHU Amiens-Picardie
3 Hôpital Necker - Enfants Malades [AP-HP]
4 UPJV - Université de Picardie Jules Verne
5 Centre hospitalier de Saint-Quentin

Objectives: This study aims to determine the rates of clinically-significant anxiety and depressive symptoms during the immediate postpartum in a sample of women referred to a university maternity department, as well as the associated risk factors and the relations with the level of maternal bonding. Patients and methods: During the third national lockdown for the COVID-19 pandemic (February-April 2021), on days 2-3 after delivery 127 mothers were administrated the Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale (EPDS), the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory (STAI-YA), the Mother-to-Infant Bonding Scale (MIBS) and questions issued from the CoRonavIruS Health Impact Survey Questionnaire (CRISIS). Results: The rate of perinatal clinically-significant symptoms were 17% for depression (EPDS cut-off ≥ 12) and 15% for anxiety (STAI-YA cut-off ≥ 40). In the multivariate analysis, being a single mother, risk of being infected by the SARS-CoV2, risk that a close relative might be infected by the SARS-CoV2 and the length of stay in maternity were associated with an increased EPDS total score, while breastfeeding was associated with a lower EPDS total score. Six variables remained positively associated with the STAI-YA total score in the multivariate model: the maternal level of academic achievement, a hospitalization during the pregnancy, peripartum medical complications, risk of being infected by the SARS-CoV2, risk of a close relative being infected by the SARS-CoV2, and physical fatigue. Low but statistically significant correlations were found between the MIBS total score and the EPDS total score (rs=0.26) and with the STAI-YA total score (rs=0.26). Discussion: The observed rates of anxiety and depressive symptoms were in the same range as those reported in observational studies conducted in high-resource countries during the COVID-19 pandemic. Risk of being infected by the SARS-CoV2 was both an independent risk factor for anxiety and depressive symptoms. The relations between the measure of maternal bonding and the severity of maternal emotional symptoms call for a better consideration of the long-term consequences of the pandemic on children's socio-emotional development.

Mots clés: COVID pandemic; anxiety; depression; maternal bonding; peripartum

Domaines: Médecine humaine et pathologie

Xavier Benarous, Charlotte Brocheton, Charline Bonnay, Laure Boissel, Cécile Crovetto, et al.. Postpartum maternal anxiety and depression during COVID-19 pandemic: rates, risk factors and relations with maternal bonding. Neuropsychiatrie de l'Enfance et de l'Adolescence, 2022, ⟨10.1016/j.neurenf.2022.12.001⟩. ⟨hal-03911080⟩