Perinatal Disorders
Advancing Public Health Opportunities
Published In: The Journal of Clinical Psychiatry, v. 69, no. 10, Oct. 2008, p. 1602-1605
Posted on RAND.org on October 01, 2008
Depression during childbearing is a major public health concern. The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality estimated that 14.5% of women develop depressive episodes during pregnancy and a similar percentage develop depression in the first 3 months following birth. The agency commented that the "specifics of the course of a depressive illness with onset during the perinatal period, including the severe physiologic and psychological challenges unique to this period that complicate the identification and management of perinatal depression, seem to suggest that this topic would have a substantial degree of high-quality research.
This report is part of the RAND Corporation External publication series. Many RAND studies are published in peer-reviewed scholarly journals, as chapters in commercial books, or as documents published by other organizations.
The RAND Corporation is a nonprofit institution that helps improve policy and decisionmaking through research and analysis. RAND's publications do not necessarily reflect the opinions of its research clients and sponsors.