Maternal Mental Health Awareness

Perinatal mood and anxiety disorders (PMADs) are one of the MOST common complications of child birth and maternal suicide is one of the leading causes of maternal death. There are more new cases of mothers suffering from maternal depression each year than women diagnosed with breast cancer!  More than 600K women suffered from MMH disorders in the US each year BEFORE COVID19 (rates are higher now) -- yet less than 15% of those diagnosed ever receive treatment. How can we as a community change these numbers? How can we prevent new cases and increase connection to care for the diagnosed cases?  
                                    💥Raise awareness
                                    💥Influence policy
                                    💥Change attitudes

I kicked the month off with a press release from Cedars-Sinai highlighting our most recent quality improvement publication. Read the press release in this LINK. To read the full research study, head over to "Favorite Links" and select "Featured Research Article."

To raise awareness, I was invited by Cedars to do an IG Take Over and it was a lot of fun! To follow a "Day in the Life" of a Reproductive Psychologist - go to Cedars Instagram and select the Green Highlight entitled "RPP DITL." A quick link to that can be found HERE.

I was also excited to be invited to chat with Alessandra Torresani on her Emotional Support Podcast about PMADs! She has always been open about her Bipolar diagnosis and she just announced that she is pregnant for the first time! I was able to share all the facts about PPD and Al said this conversation "put me at ease during my pregnancy, not letting FEAR of the unknown take over. Bipolar Psychosis is a very real diagnosis I've read so much about and I have the opportunity to break it all down." Check out the full podcast HERE!