Postpartum Depression: A Case Study

Postpartum depression has always been a hot topic in healthcare due to the factor that in impacts so many lives. Postpartum depression is characterized by feelings of extreme sadness, stress, loneliness, anxiety, being irritable and agitated, fear, and misery, worthlessness, having no interest in your baby and in some cases wanting to harm the baby (NIMH,2016). Postpartum depression is a very common mental illness which falls in the category of a mood disorder that affects every 1 in 7 women after child birth (APA, 2016). Postpartum depression is very important to mental health nursing because the mother and baby are at risk for death. It is important for the nurse to recognize the signs and symptoms of postpartum before something dangerous
In the article it discusses the impact that postpartum depression has on the infant. Infants with mother who have postpartum depression get less attention, the mothers tends to speak less to the baby and touch the baby less. The infant tends to no thrust others, reject other and tend to think of themselves as unworthy (Thompson & Fox, 2010).
There are many different things that contribute to postpartum depression. Women who have high risk pregnancies and preterm babies are at higher risk for postpartum depression. Women who have a history of depression without pregnant and who are on antidepressants and had to discontinue due to pregnant tend to develop postpartum depression. Women who are alone or have very minimal support by their partners are more at risk as well.
Some treatment used for postpartum depression includes medication. Women and doctors tend to not like to use medication as a treatment because it can be passed through the breast milk to the baby. An alternative resorts for treatment is psychotherapeutic measures to help the symptoms of postpartum depression. These include cognitive behavioral therapy, non directive counseling and psychodynamic approaches (Thompson & Fox,