Global Mental Health of Urban Mothers

Anxiety Clinical Trial

— MUM  

Official title:

Mental Health of Urban Mothers (MUM) Study: A Multi-center Randomized Controlled Trial

Clinical Trial Details — Status: Not yet recruiting

Administrative data

• NCT number: NCT04363177
• Other study ID #: P2SKP3_187728
• Status: Not yet recruiting
• Phase: N/A
• Start date: July 1, 2022
• Est. completion date: December 2024

Study information

• Verified date: March 2022
• Source: Karolinska Institutet
• Contact: Simone E Schwank, PhD
• Phone: ?+41796137255
• Email: simone.schwank[@]ki.se
• Is FDA regulated: No
• Study type: Interventional

Clinical Trial Summary

Mental health disorders are common during pregnancy and the postnatal period, and can have serious adverse effects on the well-being of woman and child. Every tenth woman has depressive symptoms and 5% suffer major depression during pregnancy. The consequences for global mental health due to the novel coronavirus disease, COVID-19, are likely to be significant and may have long-term impact on the global burden of disease. Pregnant women may be particularly vulnerable due to partial immune suppression. Besides physical vulnerability, the women could be at increased risk of mental health problems, such as anxiety, depression, and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), due to social distancing leading to less support from the family and friends, and in some cases, partners not being allowed to be present during prenatal visits, labor and delivery. Furthermore, many pregnant women may feel insecure and worried about the effect of COVID-19 on their unborn child, if the women get infected during pregnancy. Today, young urban women are used to utilizing internet services frequently and efficiently. Therefore, providing mental health support to pregnant women via web-based support may be effective in ameliorating their anxiety/depression and reduce the risk of serious mental health disorders leading to improved maternal and perinatal outcomes.

Description:

Pregnancy is a period of transition and great change, which may make some women more vulnerable to mental health problems. It is known that depressive symptoms during pregnancy may influence birth outcomes. Perinatal mental health disorders may become more prevalent during a time of acute crisis, and the prevalence of maternal anxiety, distress, and perinatal depression can be expected to increase globally, as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. However, there might be cross-national differences in the risk factors and impact of pandemic on the prevalence of perinatal mental health disorders.

Some pregnant women might be predisposed to posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) during a crisis situation, such as the COVID-19 pandemic. Mothers who developed PTSD in response to the 9/11 terrorist attacks had lower morning and evening salivary cortisol levels, compared to mothers who did not develop PTSD. Beyond effects on the mother alone, perinatal mental health issues can have long-term effects on child´s mental and physical health, as well as the participants behavior and cognition. Distress in pregnant women may affect the fetus and is known to induce epigenetic changes in the placental genes. Increased risk of psychopathology is observed in children exposed to maternal prenatal distress. Elevated maternal cortisol and epigenetic regulation of placental glucocorticoid-pathway genes are potential mechanisms for these observations. Women often express feelings of inadequacy in the new mothering role, which can furthermore negatively impact the participants mental health and the relationship to the infant.

Effective treatments are needed to address high global rates of postpartum depression (PPD) with onset typically within 4 weeks after delivery and maternal depression up to two years after delivery. Programs aimed at reducing PPD could achieve the most cost-efficient results by focusing efforts in the critical time periods around childbirth. Web-based psychosocial support provided by trained public health nurses is an effective treatment method for PPD. Limited public health resources are challenges to the accessibility of mental health services, which is why the use of web-based psychosocial support could be a good alternative. Women perceive the risk for themselves or their infants to be above average during global crises, which increases the levels of uncertainty. However, face-to-face consultations during a pandemic are likely to increase the risk of disease transmission. Therefore, easily accessible eHealth support could provide fast and resource-effective care during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The study will generate evidence on whether web-based early intervention programs could be efficient in ameliorating the risk and severity of perinatal mental health disorders, and inform best clinical practice for women affected by the consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Recruitment information / eligibility

• Status: Not yet recruiting
• Enrollment: 200
• Est. completion date: December 2024
• Est. primary completion date: July 2023
• Accepts healthy volunteers: Accepts Healthy Volunteers
• Gender: Female
• Age group: 18 Years and older

Eligibility

Inclusion Criteria:

• Pregnant women between 12 and 18 weeks of gestation

• Viable intrauterine pregnancy.

Exclusion Criteria:

• History of severe psychiatric

• Substance abuse disorder

• Requiring medical treatment

• Presence of fetal chromosomal/structural abnormality

Related Conditions & MeSH terms

• Anxiety
• COVID19
• Depression
• Perinatal Depression
• Pregnancy Related
• PTSD

Intervention

Behavioral:
• Web-based psychosocial peer-to-peer support
The evidence-based eHealth peer-to-peer psychosocial intervention "Thinking Healthy", will be tested in this RCT. In line with the World Health Organization's mhGAP Intervention Guide (mhGAP-IG), "Thinking Healthy" is used to identify and manage perinatal mental health conditions (distress, symptoms of depression, and anxiety) in non-specialized psychosocial support setting.

Locations

Country	Name	City	State
China	Shanghai Women's and Children's Health Center	Shanghai	Shanghai
Hong Kong	Chinese University Hong Kong	Hong Kong

Sponsors (2)

Lead Sponsor	Collaborator
Karolinska Institutet	Swiss National Science Foundation

Countries where clinical trial is conducted

China,  Hong Kong, 

References & Publications (7)

Brand SR, Engel SM, Canfield RL, Yehuda R. The effect of maternal PTSD following in utero trauma exposure on behavior and temperament in the 9-month-old infant. Ann N Y Acad Sci. 2006 Jul;1071:454-8. — View Citation

Brummelte S, Galea LA. Postpartum depression: Etiology, treatment and consequences for maternal care. Horm Behav. 2016 Jan;77:153-66. doi: 10.1016/j.yhbeh.2015.08.008. Epub 2015 Aug 28. Review. — View Citation

Buss C, Davis EP, Hobel CJ, Sandman CA. Maternal pregnancy-specific anxiety is associated with child executive function at 6-9 years age. Stress. 2011 Nov;14(6):665-76. doi: 10.3109/10253890.2011.623250. — View Citation

Doyle C, Werner E, Feng T, Lee S, Altemus M, Isler JR, Monk C. Pregnancy distress gets under fetal skin: Maternal ambulatory assessment & sex differences in prenatal development. Dev Psychobiol. 2015 Jul;57(5):607-25. doi: 10.1002/dev.21317. Epub 2015 May 6. — View Citation

Liang H, Acharya G. Novel corona virus disease (COVID-19) in pregnancy: What clinical recommendations to follow? Acta Obstet Gynecol Scand. 2020 Apr;99(4):439-442. doi: 10.1111/aogs.13836. Epub 2020 Mar 5. — View Citation

Monk C, Feng T, Lee S, Krupska I, Champagne FA, Tycko B. Distress During Pregnancy: Epigenetic Regulation of Placenta Glucocorticoid-Related Genes and Fetal Neurobehavior. Am J Psychiatry. 2016 Jul 1;173(7):705-13. doi: 10.1176/appi.ajp.2015.15091171. Epub 2016 Mar 25. — View Citation

Thapa SB, Mainali A, Schwank SE, Acharya G. Maternal mental health in the time of the COVID-19 pandemic. Acta Obstet Gynecol Scand. 2020 Jul;99(7):817-818. doi: 10.1111/aogs.13894. — View Citation

Outcome

Type	Measure	Description	Time frame	Safety issue
Primary	Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale (EPDS)	To investigate the impact of a web-based psychosocial intervention on Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale (EPDS) in urban women living in Hong Kong and Shanghainese women.; Scores of EPDS range from min = 0 to max=30. The higher the score, the more depressed a woman is.	4-6 weeks postpartum
Secondary	Mental health status and COVID-19	Correlation between mental health status (EPDS, GAD7, IES-R) and COVID-19 pandemic among pregnant women.; GAD 7 Generalized anxiety questionnaire IES-R Impact Event Scale to assess Post traumatic stress Disorder (PTSD) COVID-19 questionnaire	4-6 weeks postpartum
Secondary	Socio-economic status (education level, income, marital status, profession, nationality)	Impact of web-based psychosocial intervention on mental health and pregnancy outcomes among women from different socio-economic and cultural environments.; Socio-economic information gained by sociodemographic questions.	4-6 weeks postpartum
Secondary	Elective CS	Relationship between mental health status of pregnant women and rates of elective cesarean section (CS) on maternal request.	4-6 weeks postpartum