Elsevier

Journal of Affective Disorders

Volume 228, 1 March 2018, Pages 143-152
Journal of Affective Disorders

Review article
Effect of maternal postpartum depression on offspring's growth

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jad.2017.12.013Get rights and content

Highlights

  • Maternal depression affects mainly child's first-year growth.

  • Children of depressed mothers are more likely to be underweight and stunted.

  • Maternal depression is associated with child's height impairment after the first year.

Abstract

Background

Previous studies have linked maternal depression to different child offspring's growth outcomes. However, its effect has not been well established. The aim of this review was to evaluate the available evidence on the effect of maternal postpartum depression on offspring weight and height growth outcomes.

Methods

A systematic review of longitudinal studies that evaluated the effect of maternal depression on child's growth outcomes was conducted in PubMed, LILACs, Web of Science, Science Direct and PsyInfo databases, using maternal postpartum depression related keywords, according to each database searching tool.

Results

A total of 9608 articles were screened and 20 met the final inclusion criteria. The child's first-year growth was the most affected by the exposure to maternal depression. Children of depressed mothers had a higher chance of being underweight and stunted in the first year of life. Maternal depression was also associated with child's linear growth impairment after the first year.

Limitations

As a literature review, a publication bias could not be ruled out. The diversity of the published data made it unfeasible for a pooled effect to be estimated.

Conclusions

Considering the results observed on child's first year of life growth, physicians should engage in assessing maternal depression, as it is a treatable and manageable disease, thus avoiding unnecessary harm on child's physical development.

Introduction

Postpartum Depression (PPD) is a public health issue with a prevalence that varies from 3% to 19% (Gavin et al., 2005, Gelaye et al., 2016) depending on country, region and evaluation criteria. Depression is one of the most common and debilitating postpartum complications (Gaynes et al., 2005) and its symptoms include either depressed mood, loss of appetite, insomnia; or weight gain and excessive sleeping (Robinson and Stewart, 2001).

Untreated maternal depression can cause an impact on parenting abilities such as increased hostility, negative interactions, less responsiveness and communication resulting in an impaired competence as a caregiver (Lovejoy et al., 2000, Rahman et al., 2002). PPD can also interfere with childcare activities like duration of breastfeeding, sleeping routine, health care, early introduction of solid food and physical activity stimulation (Edwardson and Gorely, 2010, Stewart, 2007, Surkan et al., 2016) that can affect child growth.

Previous research has linked maternal depression to child offspring's growth outcomes. Children of depressed mothers have been related to higher risks of stunting and underweight in developing countries (Surkan et al., 2011); however, chronic exposure to maternal depression has also been associated with a higher risk of overweight and obesity during childhood and adolescence (Lampard et al., 2014).

A systematic review of the literature was conducted with the aim of evaluating the available evidence on the effect of maternal postpartum depression on offspring's growth (weight and height) outcomes.

Section snippets

Methods

Cohort and case-control studies that analyzed the effect of exposure to maternal postnatal depression on offspring's growth outcomes from birth to 18 years of age were screened and reviewed. The studies were identified on an online search of the PubMed, LILACs, Web of Science, Science Direct and PsyInfo databases. The aim was to perform a wide search using keywords related only to the exposure, maternal postnatal depression, to try to minimize the loss of any study of interest. The search was

Results

A total of 9943 articles were identified in all databases, being 9608 the available number after duplicates exclusion. Following the title and abstract assessment, 24 articles were selected for full-text analysis (Fig. 1). Exclusion criteria included cross-sectional design (n = 1), weight variation (n = 3) and abdominal circumference as the outcome of interest (n = 1), and not directly evaluating the aimed association (1). Two studies screened from the full-texts reference section were also

Discussion

The results from this review suggest that the effect of maternal depression on offspring's growth outcomes is centered on the child's first year of life growth. Different sample sizes, countries socioeconomic status and outcomes definitions seem not to have affected the results on under and overweight, wasting or stunting.

Conclusion

Maternal depression showed an effect on offspring's weight and height impaired growth during the first year of the child's life and continued linear growth deficit until the age of five. Effects on overweight and obesity were inconsistent. Studies using maternal depression symptoms screening tools provided similar results to gold standard mental-health professional's diagnosis, demonstrating that these instruments can be a suitable alternative when planning epidemiological studies.

Acknowledgements

This research did not receive any specific grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.

Contributors

The elaboration of the manuscript authors Simone Farías-Antúnez and Mariana Xavier managed the literature searches and data selection and assessment. Authors Simone Farías-Antúnez and Iná Santos wrote and reviewed the manuscript. All authors contributed to and have approved the final manuscript.

Funding

This research did not receive any specific grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.

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