The prevalence and the incidence of post-partum depression range between 10% to 20% of new mothers. Several risk factors as poor relationships or inadequate support from partner, are described in literature. Preventing depressive symptoms is particularly relevant in pregnancy and post-partum since it has been widely recognized that it interferes with a woman's ability to engage in child caring activities. A variety of psychosocial and psychological interventions have been developed to treat postpartum depression. Cognitive Behavior Therapy (CBT) and other psychological treatments are recommended by National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence. Emotion regulation is a combination of physiological, behavioral, and cognitive processes that enable individuals to manage their negative and positive emotions. To our knowledge no studies have investigated the effectiveness of emotional regulation interventions in pregnant women and its efficacy in preventing post-partum depression. Aim of this study is to evaluate the effectiveness of an emotional regulation group intervention in preventing the onset of baby blues and depressive symptoms. One hundred women at the 7th month of pregnancy (50 in the intervention /50 in the control group) will be enrolled and longitudinally followed till 10 weeks post-partum. They will be asked to fill in online /telephone questionnaires in 4 different moments (at 7th month, at 8th month -after intervention-, at 1 week post-partum -by telephone- and at 10 weeks postpartum).
A variety of psychosocial and psychological interventions has been developed to treat postpartum depression (Dennis 2007). These include cognitive-behavioral therapy and non-directive counselling (Cooper 2003; Cooper 1997), health visitor-led non-directive counselling (Wickberg 1996; Holden 1989), peer support (Dennis 2003a), and interpersonal psychotherapy (O¿Hara 2000). All this kind of intervention include various types of specialists and are effective in reducing postpartum depression's risk (Dennis 2003b; Cohen 2000). However, no studies have evaluated the effectiveness of emotional regulation interventions in preventing post-partum depression in pregnancy although evidence of the effectiveness of these kinds of intervention in preventing depression and other maladaptive behaviors exists in other populations (Renna et al, 2017; Choopan et al, 2016; Pinheiro et al, 2015). These interventions are effective in that they produce a change in emotional perceptions and in cognitive appraisals. Proving the effectiveness of emotion regulation's intervention in preventing PPD may be useful also because it is cheaper and briefer than other treatments (including cognitive behavioral therapy).
Evaluating the effectiveness of an emotional regulation treatment in preventing PPD in pregnant women represents therefore a highly innovative feature of the study.
Since different international guideline in UK (NICE, 2016) and USA (Yonkers et al., 2009) underline the importance to identify and offer preventive treatment, we believe that this study may be of great interest to the international field, knowing the absence in the literature of emotion regulation intervention for PPD prevention.