impact de la dépression postnatale maternelle précoce sur le développement cognitif du nourrisson: étude prospective sur 2 ans

Abstract

Few studies have investiga- ted whether the impact of maternal postnatal depres- sive symptoms (PNDS) on child cognitive development is independent from that of persisting depressive symp- toms. To assess whether 6-weeks PNDS predict impaired child cognitive development inde- pendently from later mater- nal depressive symptoms, 497 mother-baby dyads were followed up over 2 years with repeated measu- res of depressive maternal symptoms and infant cogni- tive development. Results shows that infants of mothers with PNDS were more likely to present with poor cognitive outcome. This association remained signifi- cant at trend level when maternal depressive state over the follow-up was adjusted for. Then the impact of early maternal PNDS on infant cognitive development may be partly explained by persistence or recurrence of maternal depressive symp- toms in the months following early postpartum.