The association between depressive symptoms during pregnancy and post-delivery fear of childbirth; a prospective study.

Background: Fear of childbirth is an important reason for a caesarean section on request.

Objective: To assess the association between depressive symptoms during pregnancy and post-delivery fear of childbirth (PFOC).

Methods: We prospectively studied pregnant women from two hospitals in the Netherlands.

The role of depressive symptoms in the pathway of demographic and psychosocial risks to preterm birth and small for gestational age.

Objective: depressive symptoms during pregnancy are associated with preterm birth (PTB) and small for gestational age (SGA). Depressive symptoms and PTB and SGA, however, share similar demographic and psychosocial risk factors. Therefore, we investigated whether depressive symptomatology is an independent risk factor, or a mediator in the pathway of demographic and psychosocial risks to PTB and SGA.

Prenatal diagnosis of alobar holoprosencephaly, cyclopia, proboscis, and isochromosome 18q in the second trimester.

We would like to present a rare case of alobar holoprosencephaly (HPE) in a fetus diagnosed by routine sonography in the second trimester. Structural sonography demonstrated multiple facial anomalies including absent nasal bone, flat facial profile, hypotelorism, fusion of the orbits and proboscis. After counseling, termination of pregnancy was performed by vaginally administered misoprostol.

Postpartum depression after mild and severe preeclampsia.

Objective: To describe the prevalence of postpartum depressive symptoms after preeclampsia, to assess the extent to which the prevalence of postpartum depressive symptoms differs after mild and severe preeclampsia, and to investigate which factors contribute to such differences.

Methods: Women diagnosed with preeclampsia (n=161) completed the Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale (EPDS) at 6, 12, or 26 weeks postpartum. Multiple logistic regression analysis was used to investigate the association between severity of preeclampsia, contributing factors and postpartum depression (PPD) (1) at any time during the first 26 weeks postpartum and (2) accounting for longitudinal observations at three time points.