Does paternal perinatal depression have an effect on child health?

2^nd International Conference on General Practice & Primary Care

September 18-20, 2017 | Zurich, Switzerland

Ersin Akpinar and Mehmet Nedim Tiras

Cukurova University Family Medicine Department, Turkey

Posters & Accepted Abstracts: J Gen Pract (Los Angel)

Abstract :

Maternal perinatal depression and its effects on both the mother�s health and her child�s development is well-recognized health issue. What is often not considered is the mental health of fathers in the perinatal periods, there are limited studies on pregnancy-related paternal depression studies suggest that the paternal depression rate might be raised during pregnancy and postnatally as is seen in mothers. Paternal prenatal and postnatal depression showed an overall rate of paternal depression between the first trimester and 1 year postpartum of 10.4 %, suggesting that paternal depression represents a significant public health concern. The influence of paternal depression on child development has been revealed in several large-scale longitudinal studies. If fathers experience depression by 8 weeks after childbirth, the risk of their child developing behavioral and emotional problems at 3.5 years old is doubled, and the risk of mental illness at 7 years old increases 1.7-fold. Paternal depression predicted negative effects on child development. Early paternal depression was a significant predictor of a child�s behavioral difficulties and low developmental outcomes from a large-scale study. Paternal depression has been reported to correlate with an unwillingness to participate in child-rearing. Compared to non-depressed fathers, depressed fathers have a significantly lower engagement in positive enrichment activity with the child. In addition, paternal postnatal depression was reported to correlate with a poor marital relationship. It seems evident that paternal depression is harmful for child development. Therefore, the identification of factors relevant to paternal postnatal depression is important for its prevention and early detection.