New mothers are too scared to tell GPs about postnatal depression

Women with postnatal depression are being left without help because they are scared of being thought an unfit mother, a report suggests.

The study by the National Childbirth Trust suggests half of new mothers suffer mental health problems during pregnancy or within the first year of their child’s birth.

But 42 per cent of those reporting such experiences said their problems were never detected by a health professional.

In one fifth of cases, GPs did not even ask about their emotional wellbeing, the NCT report said.

Just as commonly, new mothers felt unable to disclose their anxiety.

In total, 46 per cent of those who felt unable to speak up worried that health professionals would think they were not capable of looking after their baby. And almost as many said doctors did not seem interested or sympathetic, while one quarter said there was no time.

Every new mother is supposed to be offered a postnatal check-up by their GP, six weeks after the birth of their child.

But the poll of more than 1,000 new mothers found that one in three said their check up took three minutes or less. Often the slot was mainly spent checking on the health of the baby, leaving little or no time to discuss how the mother was feeling, the survey found.

The charity is calling for an overhaul of the system of checks, so that new mothers get a GP appointment dedicated only to their own health.

Sarah McMullen, head of knowledge at NCT said: "It is shocking that so many new mothers aren't getting the help they need which can have a devastating impact on the women and their families."

"Some mothers aren't being open about how they're feeling as they're terrified they're going to have their baby taken away and others are not being asked about their emotional wellbeing at all.”

Professor Helen Stokes-Lampard, chairman of the Royal College of GPs, said the checks were an important opportunity to discuss a new mother’s health and wellbeing.

But she said: “It's incredibly hard for GPs to explore all the physical and psychological factors affecting our patients' health within the time constraints of the consultation as it stands.

“We need these checks to be much longer as standard, so that we are able to give the same attention to the new mother as we do to the baby - but this needs more resources for our service, and more GPs."

It came as research found that one eight NHS trusts have been rated “red” for their rates of stillbirths and neonatal deaths.

Research led by the University of Leicester found a small drop in national rates of stillbirths, while neonatal death rates were barely changed.

The audit of 165 NHS trusts and health boards across Britain, labelled 21 as "red" - meaning that they have a mortality rate at least 10 per cent more than would be expected.

Twelve organisations were rated green - with death rates more than 10 per cent lower than would be expected, with the remainder falling into amber and yellow categories in between.

Overall, researchers found that the rate of stillbirth in the UK reduced by 8 per cent between 2013 to 2015. In 2015, the stillbirth rate was 3.87 per 1,000 total births, a fall from 4.20 per 1,000 total births in 2013.

But the authors said that despite the fall, UK stillbirth rates still remain high compared with many similar European countries and there remains "significant variation" across Britain.

The neonatal death rate remained fairly static with a fall between 2013 and 2015 from 1.84 to 1.74 deaths per 1,000 live births.

Professor Lesley Regan, president of the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, added: "Although the findings are welcome, there is still some way to go to address the high death rates and level of variation across the UK, which are still too high when compared to similar European countries.

"Disappointingly, the findings only show a small reduction in neonatal death rates.”