The effects of light therapy on depression and sleep in women during pregnancy or the postpartum period: A systematic review and meta-analysis

Abstract

Background: In recent years, light therapy has been tried for the treatment of depression and sleep in pregnancy or postnatal period women, but the results have been inconclusive. This meta-analysis is the first to systematically review the effects of light therapy on depression and sleep disturbances in women during pregnancy and the postnatal period. Methods: We searched for randomized controlled studies in PubMed, Embase, Cochrane Library, Web of Science, Chinese National Knowledge Infrastructure, and Chinese Biomedical Database up to January 2023. The standardized mean difference (SMD) was used to assess the efficacy of the outcome indicators. Results: Eight studies were eventually included in the analysis. The results showed that light therapy was more effective than the placebo group in terms of depression (SMD =.34, CI =.08–.61) and sleep (SMD =.64,95%CI =.28–1.00). Subgroup analysis could not explain the significant heterogeneity. There were no serious adverse effects in either the light therapy or placebo groups. Conclusions: Light therapy could be considered an effective treatment for depression and sleep disturbances in women during pregnancy and the postnatal period. However, future high-quality trials with larger sample sizes are still needed.