New research to help mums mental health announced for Harrogate

New research to help mums who are struggling with their mental health after birth will soon be launched across Harrogate.

It comes as concerns have been raised about how much lockdown and the current pandemic will have affected new parents’ mental wellbeing.

Jo McGregor suffered with post-natal depression after having her children – she's now an advocate for the issue.

She said: "Parents of newborns have been incredibly hard hit by the pandemic and continue to be vulnerable. It's because it looks very different to perhaps what you would've expected in that antenatal and postnatal period, as well as whilst you're having your baby.

"Anybody that's pregnant now or expecting is going to be feeling really vulnerable and wondering what it's going to look like.

"We know that maternity services are doing absolutely everything they can for new parents but the resources are so stretched."

Improving perinatal mental health services has been highlighted as a key priority for the West Yorkshire and Harrogate Health and Care Partnership (WY&H HCP), as set out in both Better Births – the national maternity review 2016 and the Long term Plan for the NHS 2019.

The Partnership has announced that it is funding research into the reasons behind inequalities in treatment of people who experience mental ill health during pregnancy and the first year after the birth of a child.

It is estimated that one in four mothers suffers from mental health problems during this period and it is estimated that 5-10% fathers also develop mental health difficulties during this time.

Jo McGregor carried out a survey with parents who have had a baby during the current crisis and found over 50% of respondents have struggled with their mental health after giving birth.

She said: "That maybe means they're not on medication for it or they haven't had talking therapy or peer support. It highlights that there has been real hole in mental health support for new mums during the pandemic."

Whilst maternal mortality has declined progressively over time, to a level of nine deaths per 100,000 maternities in the UK, 23% of these deaths are from mental health related causes, with one in seven dying through suicide.

There are concerns that Black Asian and Minority Ethnic (BAME) groups and people living in deprived communities might be less likely to have their mental health illnesses identified, recorded or treated.

The new research aims to uncover what the reasons are behind this disparity and to identify examples of good practice to overcome these barriers across the whole of the West Yorkshire and Harrogate area.

This work will help the Partnership to work with women and families to make recommendations for changes to services to make care more equal for all women.

Dr Sara Munro, CEO Lead for WY&H HCP Mental Health, Learning Disabilities and Autism; and CEO for Leeds and York Partnership NHS Foundation Trust said: “As part of the national commitment to specialist perinatal mental health services and through the work of our collaborative in West Yorkshire we now have full specialist community provision as well as dedicated inpatient services for those mums and babies who need them.

"However, we know there is variation in who can and does access these services which increases health inequalities. We have chosen to invest in research to understand this variation to help us improve the services we provide and ensure all mums who need this support can access it.

“The project has been funded by pooling perinatal mental health transformation monies across local clinical commissioning groups, which has enabled us to ensure we have a robust study to inform our future work across all our places.”

The research team is a collaboration between Born in Bradford, the University of York and the University of Huddersfield. Together the team will bring expertise in perinatal mental health, applied health research, systems change, health inequalities and analysis of large data to lead an exciting piece of work that will help improve PMH services across the region.

Prof John Wright, Director of Research, Bradford Institute of Health Research said: “Born in Bradford has completed a lot of work to understand the barriers that stop some women from having their mental health problems recognised or treated, but we don’t know if these barriers are the same in other areas.

"We are really pleased to be working in partnership with the West Yorkshire and Harrogate Health and Care Partnership to extend our research to see what the experiences of perinatal mental health are for women living in different areas of the region.”