Children’s National partnership addresses postpartum depression

Physician researchers at Children’s National Hospital have partnered with Assistant Professor Niyousha Hosseinichimeh, Ph.D., in Virginia Tech’s College of Engineering to introduce screenings for postpartum depression.

This is all part of a four year $1.8 million grant from the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) that funds a Perinatal Mood and Anxiety Patient Safety Lab. The goal is to improve mental health screening for parents through referral and treatment, combining medical expertise with systems engineering to advance healthcare.

Research shows one in eight new moms will experience sadness, hopelessness and feelings of overwhelm in the first year after having a baby, a statistic that is even higher for those with newborns receiving emergency services.

Q: How will this partnership drive research forward in postpartum depression?
A: “In this collaboration with Children’s National, we are looking at the parents of children who are being seen in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) and emergency department. In a pediatric setting, there aren’t services or providers who can treat the parents or adults of the children receiving treatment, but data shows that these caregivers are more likely to need mental health services,” Hosseinichimeh said. “Right now, the screening rate is low, and we want to understand how we can improve the screening and referral process to provide better mental healthcare for adults in these settings.

Q: What does the public need to know about postpartum depression?
A: “After admission to our NICU, 45% of parents screen positive for depression. I can’t think of any other disorder or disease that screens positive at 45%. Similarly, mothers of infants in our emergency department screened positive at 27%. This can’t be ignored,” said Lamia Soghier, M.D., neonatologist and associate division chief for NICU operations at Children’s National.