EMPIRICAL STUDIES doi: 10.1111/j.1471-6712.2008.00667.x Prevalence of postpartum depression in two municipalities in Norway Kari Glavin RN, MScN (PhD Student, Associate Professor) 1 , Lars Smith PhD (Professor) 2 and Ragnhild Sørum MSc (Statistician) 3 1 Department of Nursing Research, Diakonova University College, 2 National Network for the Study of Infant Mental Health, and Institute of Psychology, University of Oslo and 3 The Cancer Registry of Norway, Oslo, Norway Scand J Caring Sci; 2009; 23; 705–710 Prevalence of postpartum depression in two municipalities in Norway The objectives of this study were (i) to describe the prevalence of postpartum depression (PPD) in two Nor- wegian municipalities and (ii) to investigate whether mothers’ age and parity are related to the development of PPD. A total of 2227 women, 437 from M1 and 1790 from M2 participated in the study. Mothers who had given birth between 1 May, 2005 and 31 December, 2006 completed The Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale (EPDS) at well baby clinics 6 weeks after delivery. The prevalence of PPD (EPDS ‡ 10) was 10.1%. How- ever, there was a significant difference between the municipalities, with a prevalence of 14.4% in M1 and 9% in M2. Primiparous mothers showed a higher prev- alence than multiparous mothers did, and the oldest mothers (36 years and over) showed the highest preva- lence. PPD is an issue of importance in Norway, as in many other countries. Public health services should be aware of the higher risk of PPD among primiparous mothers and especially among older primiparous moth- ers. A small difference in the information provided by nurses to the mothers in the two groups at the home visit 2 weeks postpartum may have produced a signifi- cant difference in the prevalence of PPD. The findings may have implications for service delivery in public health. Keywords: postpartum depression, prevalence, public health nurse, parity, mothers’ age. Submitted 11 February 2008, Accepted 27 August 2008 Introduction There is consensus in the literature that 25–80% of mothers suffer from mood lability and mild depression during the first weeks after parturition. About 10–15% suffers from mild to moderate depression disorder, also called postpartum depression (PPD). Several prevalence studies have been reported that use different screening tools and different points of time for screening (1, 2). The prevalence of PPD in these studies ranges from 0% to al- most 60%. In some countries, there are few reports of PPD, whereas in other countries reported postpartum depressive symptoms are very prevalent (1, 2). The present study reports on the prevalence of PPD in two large municipal- ities in the eastern part of Norway. Pregnancy and birth are especially vulnerable periods in a woman’s life. PPD generally occurs within 4–6 weeks after childbirth and includes symptoms such as low mood, forgetfulness, anxiety, irritability, poor functioning and sleep disturbance. PPD may also have a negative long-term effect on a woman’s mental health as it may increase the risk of continuing or recurrent depression (2). Further- more, protracted psychological health problems in mothers are related to deficient psychomotor and emotional devel- opment among their children (3–5). Unfortunately, it is reported that only a few of women with PPD are identified by public health services (5–9). In order to plan resources and provide help to these women it is important for the primary healthcare system to know the size of the problem. PPD is of concern to professionals in primary healthcare services because it may affect the health of mothers and the health and development of their babies (6, 10). Two Norwegian validation studies using the Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale (EPDS) as a screening instru- ment showed that the prevalence of PPD was 10% (11) and 8.9%, respectively (12). The sample sizes, however, were small and there is a need for larger prevalence studies in Norway. In the current study, we used the EPDS to screen all postpartum women in two municipalities in Norway. The aim of the investigation was to describe the Correspondence to: Kari Glavin, Diakonova University College, Linstows gate 5, Oslo N-0166, Norway. E-mail: kari.glavin@diakonova.no Ó 2009 The Authors. Journal compilation Ó 2009 Nordic College of Caring Science 705