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Postpartum psychosis is a life-threatening condition for both the mother and her newborn baby. The symptoms of this serious disease include, among others, psychomotor agitation, various types of hallucinations and delusions. What exactly might suggest postpartum psychosis? How is her treatment going?

Postpartum psychosisis a relatively rare mental disorder. It is estimated to develop in 1 to 2 in 1,000 women who have had a baby. It is classified as a psychiatric emergency. Typically, symptoms of postpartum psychosis develop within a few days to several weeks after the end of pregnancy.

Many women in the postnatal period struggle with difficulties such as anxiety, mood swings and irritability. They are often caused by fluctuations in the levels of various hormones in the female body. There are times, however, that some women eventually develop certain psychiatric disorders related to pregnancy and childbirth. The most famous of these is postpartum depression. A much more serious problem ispostpartum psychosis .

Postpartum Psychosis: Causes

As in the case of many different mental disorders and diseases, its causes have not yet been clearly established in the case of postpartum psychosis.

Women with psychiatric problems are noticeably more likely to develop postpartum psychosis.

This risk depends on the specific unit. For example, in women with bipolar disorder and schizoaffective disorder, it is as high as 25%.

Other mental disorders that also increase the risk of postpartum psychosis include:

  • severe personality disorder,
  • depressive disorder,
  • anxiety disorders,
  • sleep disturbance.

Patients who have had it in the past and those whose relatives experienced postpartum psychosis also have a greater risk of developing postpartum psychosis.

A factor that increases the risk of developing the disease is also the abuse of alcohol and drugs.

The incidence of postpartum psychosis is not only influenced by nature problemspsychiatric. Other risk factors include:

  • brain tumors,
  • diseases of the thyroid gland (e.g. hyperthyroidism),
  • stroke due to eclampsia or pre-eclampsia,
  • use of certain medications (e.g. glucocorticosteroids),
  • caesarean section.

Postpartum Psychosis: Symptoms

The symptoms of postpartum psychosis come on suddenly. Psychomotor agitation often occurs, which may be accompanied by aggressive behavior.

Patients may be in an elevated mood, they can be irritable, but also convinced of their own uniqueness or have significant mood swings.

It is not uncommon to have a reduced need for sleep, decreased appetite or cognitive decline. In generalthe most common form of the individual is manic psychosis .

The course of postpartum psychosis is quite often very dynamic and some of its symptoms can be replaced by other ailments. As the name of the problem implies,psychotic symptomscan also be associated with it. They can take the form of various delusions and hallucinations.

Delusions

In the case of delusions, the most common are duplicitous and persecutory delusions (e.g. that the patient may be followed by someone).

However, delusions about the child are also possible (e.g. the belief that his body has changed in some unusual way).

Hallucinations

A symptom of postpartum psychosis can also be hallucinations, e.g. visual or auditory (e.g. voices heard by the patient that may order her to harm her baby).

Life-threatening condition

Postpartum psychosis is considered a life-threatening condition for a reason. In its course, intrusive thoughts may appear, which may take the form of, for example, ideas about the potential ejection of the child through the window.

One of the greatest threats associated with the individual, however, issuicide and infanticide .

It is estimated that infanticide is carried out by about 4% of patients with postpartum psychosis.

Postpartum psychosis: diagnosis

In a situation where postpartum psychosis develops in a woman in a gynecological or obstetric ward, an urgent psychiatric consultation is absolutely necessary.

Call for help

It happens, however, that the first symptoms of the disease appear only after the patient returns home. In such a situation, the family should go with the woman to a psychiatric emergency room or (if there is absolutely no such emergency room)opportunities due to, for example, significant psychomotor agitation of the patient) call an ambulance.

The patient, due to her delusions, may refuse to go to the hospital. However, postpartum psychosis, as a life-threatening condition, may be an indication for psychiatric hospitalization without the patient's consent (which results from the provisions of the Mental He alth Protection Act).

Diagnostic methods

Postpartum psychosis is diagnosed on the basis of a psychiatric examination. It should be emphasized, however, that the diagnosis itself does not really end the diagnostic process.

As mentioned earlier, its causes may be, for example, hormonal disorders or diseases of the central nervous system. Therefore, the diagnostics may be extended, inter alia, by o head imaging tests or laboratory tests.

Postpartum Psychosis: Treatment

The first step in dealing with postpartum psychosis is to ensure the safety of both the mother and her baby. When absolutely necessary, the patient may be hospitalized in a psychiatric hospital on an emergency basis.

Initially, two groups of drugs are used in the treatment:

  • sedative preparations
  • and antipsychotics.

The first group includes benzodiazepines (such as diazepam or alprazolam), which are administered to control the patient's agitation.

Antipsychotics (neuroleptics) are designed to reduce psychotic symptoms. Examples of measures belonging to this group include: olanzapine, quetiapine, risperidone and haloperidol.

In addition to the above-mentioned preparations, mood-stabilizing drugs (mood stabilizers), such as valproic acid s alts, lamotrigine and lithium s alts, are also used in the treatment of postpartum psychosis.

In some patients, pharmacological treatment fails to achieve satisfactory treatment results. If pharmacotherapy is ineffective, electroconvulsive therapy may be used.

Childbirth psychosis: prognosis

The prognosis for postpartum psychosis is difficult to define unequivocally. In different patients, the unit may actually be different.

The most pronounced symptoms of postpartum psychosis last up to 12 weeks. However, other ailments, such as mood swings or a feeling of anxiety, may persist for up to a year or more after getting sick.

It is worth mentioning here thatpatients who developed psychosispostpartum, have a significantly increased risk of its recurrence after another pregnancy- it may even exceed 30%.

For this reason, psychoeducation is extremely important, i.e. informing patients and their families, e.g. about postpartum ailments that might suggest a recurrence of postpartum psychosis.

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Psychology