Pregnant people with multiple sclerosis at increased risk for mental illness
It is known that mood and anxiety disorders during the peripartum period (during pregnancy or the first year following childbirth) may negatively affect the mother and child, but little research has looked at pregnant mothers with multiple sclerosis (MS) and their experiences with mental illness.
Colleen Maxwell, professor at the University of Waterloo School of Pharmacy, and her colleagues were featured in a press release in Neurology, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology, on their recent research that examined whether mental illnesses in pregnant people with MS occur at a higher rate than those without the disease.
This study examined depression, anxiety, bipolar disorder, psychosis, suicide attempts and substance use, during pregnancy and up to the first three years after giving birth.
“Persons living with MS have a higher risk for experiencing mental illness throughout their lives,” says Maxwell. “This study showed that this increased risk for mental illness extends to the peripartum period.”
The researchers examined existing healthcare use data from Ontario for 894, 852 mothers. They compared mothers with MS to mothers with three other common chronic conditions (epilepsy, inflammatory bowel disease and diabetes) and mothers without any of these conditions. They assessed the number of existing as well as newly diagnosed cases of mental illness for all mothers during the same period.
It was found that both existing and newly diagnosed mental illnesses (during pregnancy and after birth) were relatively more common among mothers with MS, compared to mothers without any of the chronic conditions. About 42% of mothers with MS had any mental illness during pregnancy and this increased to 50.3% during the first year after birth, with the most common conditions being anxiety and depression.
The study findings illustrate that all providers involved in the care of persons with MS need to be aware of the increased likelihood of mental illness during the peripartum period, so that appropriate and timely preventive and treatment strategies may be implemented.
Maxwell collaborated with Dr. Ruth Ann Marrie, professor at Dalhousie University and lead author of the study and other colleagues including: Dr. James Bolton and Dr. Charles Bernstein, professors from the University of Manitoba, Dr. Kristen Krysko, assistant professor, and Dr. Dalia Rotstein, associate professor at the University of Toronto, Dr. Kyla McKay, assistant professor and Dr. Neda Razaz, senior lecturer, at Karolinska Institutet , Vicki Ling, Ping Li and Priscila Pequeno, analysts from ICES, and Karma Deakin-Harb, patient partner.
Their study, Peripartum Mental Illness in Mothers With Multiple Sclerosis and Other Chronic Diseases in Ontario, Canada, was supported by MS Canada and ICES.