Depression during pregnancy rises in a generation

Anxiety and depressive symptoms during pregnancy have risen by 51 per cent within a generation according to findings from a major study by the University of Bristol published last week [Friday 13 July]. Using unique data from two generations who took part in Bristol's Children of the 90s longitudinal study, researchers examined responses to questions completed by the women during pregnancy to compare levels of depressive symptoms more than 20 years apart. Looking at the responses of 2,390 of the original women who were recruited to the study in the early 1990s and then 180 of their daughter's generation who became pregnant by the age of 24, researchers found that having high depressive symptoms was 51 per cent more common in the current generation. Today 25 per cent of young mums have high depressive symptoms compared to 17 per cent in the 1990s according to the research published by JAMA Network Open . If their mother was depressed in pregnancy, daughters were also more than three times as likely to be depressed in their pregnancy. It is the first time that scientists have been able to compare mental health symptoms in pregnancy across generations and marks the beginnings of a new wave of health and social policy research that is planned using data from three generations. This has been made possible by the unique data available in the Children of the 90s study and funding from the Medical Research Council , Wellcome Trust , National Institute for Health Research , European Research Council and US National Institutes of Health.