Screening an Australian community sample for risk of postnatal depression

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Abstract
This exploratory study on the transition to motherhood focused on screening a community sample of Australian women to identify those mothers at risk of having postnatal depression. Seventy‐one first‐time mothers completed the Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale approximately 6 weeks after childbirth. The results indicated that 35.2% of the first‐time mothers in the sample required further investigation. That is, approximately 35% of the community sample reported experiencing significant difficulties in their transition to motherhood. A total of 25.4% of these women were identified as being at risk of experiencing depression, and between 9.9% and 15.7% were identified as being at risk of experiencing severe depressive symptomol‐ogy. The study therefore identified a significant proportion of first‐time mothers, within a community sample, experiencing difficulties in the early postpartum period of a severity which warranted further clinical assessment for postnatal depression. These findings have significant implications for the prevention and management of postnatal depression in the community. The study underscores the need for more community‐based research into the challenges and difficulties that women endure at this critical developmental stage.

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