Early mother-infant interactions within the context of childbirth-related posttraumatic stress symptoms.

Background: Childbirth may lead to perinatal mental health issues, such as childbirth-related posttraumatic stress symptoms (CB-PTSS), depression, and anxiety. Despite well explored mother-infant interactions in the context of maternal depression and anxiety, only limited studies investigated mother-infant interactions in the context of CB-PTSS, which is the aim of the present study.

Methods: One-hundred mother-infant dyads in the French speaking part of Switzerland were classified into three groups: birth-related symptoms (BRS, i.