Research presented during the 2017 American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) national conference found that 45 percent of parents experience depression, anxiety, and stress when their newborns leave the National Health Systems neonatal intensive care unit (NICU).
The figure is quite staggering. The study also found that parents who were anxious the most were also the most depressed. Gender, gestational age at birth and length of the baby’s NICU stay were associated with parents having more pronounced depressive symptoms. Interestingly, stress levels were lower amongst fathers, when compared to mothers. Older parents also had lower stress levels than those experienced by younger parents.
Read more about this research in this ScienceDaily article:
