A new study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association Psychiatry reveals that one in seven new mothers may be suffering from postpartum depression.
The postnatal condition is a form of depression that is experienced after a woman gives birth and usually occurs within three months from when the mother delivered.
A cause has yet to be determined, however, experts speculate that the mental illness may be related to hormone changes that are experienced during and after pregnancy.
This type of clinical depression ranges from cases that are moderate to severe and include risk factors like being younger than 20 and alcohol, drug or tobacco use.
Other risk factors include having an unplanned pregnancy, mixed feelings about the pregnancy as well as a medical history of depression, bipolar disorder or anxiety disorders.
But not all cases of postpartum depression are identified or even treated.
"The vast majority of postpartum women with depression are not identified or treated even though they are at higher risk for psychiatric disorders," said Dr. Katherine Wisner, the study's lead author and director of the Asher Centre for Research and Treatment of Depression at Northwestern University in Chicago.
"A lot of women do not understand what is happening to them. They think they're just stressed or they believe it is how having a baby is supposed to feel," Wisner told the Telegraph.
Researchers evaluated 10,000 women for depression as part of the study via telephone interviews between four to six weeks after labor.
"We asked them whether they had been able to laugh and see the funny side of things...(as well as their) ability to look forward with enjoyment to things, whether or not they're blaming themselves necessarily when things go wrong, feeling anxious or worried for no good reason, being scared or panicky for no good reason," said Dorothy Sit, an investigator for the study and psychiatrist at the University of Pittsburgh.
Some experts believe that all women should be screened for postpartum depression.
"I think we still in this country really do not recognize mental health issues, we still have that Puritan, pull-yourself-up-by-your-bootstraps, be-tough attitude," said June Horowitz who was not involved in the study and is a postpartum depression researcher and professor of nursing at Boston College.
"It should be the gold standard that everyone gets screened for postpartum depression," she told the Pittsburg Post-Gazette.
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