Women's Quality of Life and Postpartum Depression

Postpartum depression (PPD) constitutes a major problem following childbirth that may affect women’s quality of life. The current study was performed to assess the relationship between women's quality of life and postpartum depression among women attending Gachsaran’s health care centers in 2013.
Material & In this cross-sectional study, 350 postpartum women with and without PPD were selected using the convenience sampling method. PPD was measured by the Edinburg Postnatal Depression Scale and quality of life was assessed using SF-36 questionnaire. Mean scores of SF-36 were compared between postpartum depressed women and non-depressed women at fourth week and sixteenth week after childbirth and within groups. Data analysis was conducted using the paired t-test, independent t-test and Chi square. A P value less than .05 was considered significant.
The findings showed that there were significant differences in six out of eight mean scores of quality of life dimensions including bodily pain, general health, social functioning, role-emotional, vitality, and mental wellbeing, between postpartum depressed women and non-depressed women (p˂0.001). Comparison of mean scores of quality of life dimensions from fourth week to sixteenth week of postpartum revealed that postpartum depressed women scored lower on all of quality of life dimensions compared to non-depressed women. Despite the increased scores of quality of life in depressed women at the sixteenth week of postpartum, differences were not statistically significant except bodily pain.
Postpartum depression is associated with poor quality of life. Thus, postpartum depression screening during routine postnatal care and efforts to improve women's quality of life is important.